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Mental Major 
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DISABILITY |
Mental
vegative state (Amnesia) |
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NOTES |
A film
derived from the experiences of Dr. Oliver Sacks. |
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A doctor
works in the chronic care ward of a Bronx hospital |
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(c.1969).
This could be the usual drama of the new doctor |
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being right
while everyone else is wrong as he seeks to |
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'revive' the
patients in a vegetative state. But this film avoids |
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sentimentality and the acting of Williams and De Niro make
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this a
thought provoking film rather than one about miraculous |
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The patients
have something called encephalitis lethargic. |
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The drug
Sacks uses is L-Dopa. |
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Personally I
found the film boring and tedious. It might have |
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been better
without the overacting of De Niro. This kind of |
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film is more
acceptable without big-name actors. The film |
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concentrates
on the recovery of just one patient and like many dramas about
mental recovery the rest of the patients are just
wallpaper. Though we do see that some patients have regressed. |
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It seems to
me that some critics often tend to over praise |
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films which
they consider well-meaning and involve subjects |
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Notes
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