Overlooked but fantastic
Added 3/26/2009
This starts slow, then looks as though it will be a rather sour farce -- then it just veers off in another direction and becomes, for me, impossible to turn away from. I first watched this in the late 1990s. I remember Anne Bancroft and Wallace Shawn so vividly that I was shocked to see how little screen time their pivotal scenes really occupied. The opposing choices these two characters offered have stayed with me with surprising constancy in the full decade since. I was happy to find this DVD and watch the movie again, because Netflix doesn't carry it, and the movie seems lost in critical obscurity. James Spader, Albert Brooks, and Helen Mirren all give first-class performances in a sharp script that goes way beyond the initial cheap-shot bashing of our terrifying medical-industrial system. In its acid tone, this is a bit like "House" minus the puzzle-solving, but in its moral philosophy it's more like "The Screwtape Letters." I'm really glad I bought this.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
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Great DVD for covering topic of vegetative euthanasia
Added 1/11/2009
This is a great tragi-comedy with James Spader
as it treats the sensitive topic of euthanasia.
1 out of 1 people found this helpful.
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FIVE STAR INDEPENDENT FILM
Added 1/8/2007
Lumet does it again. Inspirational and enlightening, Lumet highlights the struggle between what is right and what is expedient. he focuses on the weakness of expediency, the strength of the almighty dollar, and the pull of conscience (for some who have one), always cast aside by profiteers and how the choices are the test of character which most people fail. A great cast: Helen Mirren, James Spader, Kira Sedgewick, Albert Brooks, Anne Bancroft, Ed Herrman, and more, weigh in on profit versus Goodness, "do unto others...".
The issue at hand is one of the ethical questions of our era pertaining to the technical capacity to keep people "Alive" virtually forever, or let them go to God.
The difficult problem is handled with a fine mix/balance of humor, satire, apoplexy, empathy and commonsense. After seeing it on IFC we bought a copy. Spader is the physician for a comatose man whose two daughters are divided on the issue of maintaining him in a vegetative state or pulling the plug. However, at stake is $10,000.000 which goes to one sister if the plug is pulled and another if it is not. the battle widens when an army of lawyers for the hospital, the doctors, the insurance companies and each sister, weigh-in.
The moral/ethical/financial (the patient has iron cald insurance, which the hospital loves).
Those who actually have a conscience will love the ending.
2 out of 2 people found this helpful.
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Smart Esoteric Movie
Added 4/16/2006
If you are medical doctor involved in making life and death decisions, you will really appreciate the ideas in this movie.
2 out of 2 people found this helpful.
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Good Description of Our Medical System in the USA
Added 8/9/2005
I'm not sure about the movie itself, but it addresses the real issues of today's medical system where no one cares about patients and all they want is money.
In reality, however, it does not end like this movie. In the movie two parties come to an agreement convinced by a doctor, but I am sure people are kept alive just for a cash flow to be running. It is very sad, but that's how it is.
I like some of humors seen in the movie. Independant Film Channel has given this movie two stars, but I think it is too harsh. It should have at least three stars or more.
3 out of 4 people found this helpful.
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Overlooked but fantastic
Added 3/26/2009
This starts slow, then looks as though it will be a rather sour farce -- then it just veers off in another direction and becomes, for me, impossible to turn away from. I first watched this in the late 1990s. I remember Anne Bancroft and Wallace Shawn so vividly that I was shocked to see how little screen time their pivotal scenes really occupied. The opposing choices these two characters offered have stayed with me with surprising constancy in the full decade since. I was happy to find this DVD and watch the movie again, because Netflix doesn't carry it, and the movie seems lost in critical obscurity. James Spader, Albert Brooks, and Helen Mirren all give first-class performances in a sharp script that goes way beyond the initial cheap-shot bashing of our terrifying medical-industrial system. In its acid tone, this is a bit like "House" minus the puzzle-solving, but in its moral philosophy it's more like "The Screwtape Letters." I'm really glad I bought this.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
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Great DVD for covering topic of vegetative euthanasia
Added 1/11/2009
This is a great tragi-comedy with James Spader
as it treats the sensitive topic of euthanasia.
1 out of 1 people found this helpful.
|
FIVE STAR INDEPENDENT FILM
Added 1/8/2007
Lumet does it again. Inspirational and enlightening, Lumet highlights the struggle between what is right and what is expedient. he focuses on the weakness of expediency, the strength of the almighty dollar, and the pull of conscience (for some who have one), always cast aside by profiteers and how the choices are the test of character which most people fail. A great cast: Helen Mirren, James Spader, Kira Sedgewick, Albert Brooks, Anne Bancroft, Ed Herrman, and more, weigh in on profit versus Goodness, "do unto others...".
The issue at hand is one of the ethical questions of our era pertaining to the technical capacity to keep people "Alive" virtually forever, or let them go to God.
The difficult problem is handled with a fine mix/balance of humor, satire, apoplexy, empathy and commonsense. After seeing it on IFC we bought a copy. Spader is the physician for a comatose man whose two daughters are divided on the issue of maintaining him in a vegetative state or pulling the plug. However, at stake is $10,000.000 which goes to one sister if the plug is pulled and another if it is not. the battle widens when an army of lawyers for the hospital, the doctors, the insurance companies and each sister, weigh-in.
The moral/ethical/financial (the patient has iron cald insurance, which the hospital loves).
Those who actually have a conscience will love the ending.
2 out of 2 people found this helpful.
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