Critical Analysis Of The Movie Awakenings

A Critical analysis of the film Awakenings

Magbanua, Mark Albert S.

BSN 1-2

De La Salle Health Sciences Institute

Submitted to: Ms. Cherish Chua

II. Introduction The film Awakenings is a film directed by Penny Marshall. It was an adaptation of Oliver Sacks’ novel “Awakenings” back in 1973. The film’s main story scoped the year 1969 when a neurologist, Dr. Malcolm Sayer (played by Robin Williams) made a research about the cure for encephalitis lethargica, a severe brain disease that has the same symptoms of parkinson’s disease. The disease first appeared during the 1920’s up until Dr. Sayer’s professional neurologist career in 1960’s. The film also scoped

Malcolm Sayer tried to bring a cure to the encephalitis lethargica during the disease’s major outbreak four decades ago. The casts re-enact an excellent masterpiece as it tackled deep into each point of views of persons involved in the entire plot. "There is a raw, subversive element in De Niro 's performance: He doesn 't shrink from letting Leonard seem grotesque. Yet Awakenings, unlike the infinitely superior Rain Man, isn 't really built around the quirkiness of its lead character. The movie views Leonard piously; it turns him into an icon of feeling. And so even if you 're held as I was by the acting, you may find yourself fighting the film 's design." (Gleiberman, n.d.). Owen Gleiberman observed De Niro’s act as a pious at first but became a rebel at the scenes. This indicated that De Niro created an imagery of an unpredictable person. De Niro’s act led the film to be more interesting and emotional. De Niro’s acting was tested as superb if we pertain to the actor’s history of films, De Niro stood out as a highly flexible actor especially on this film for the reason that the critics observed the actor’s ability to act as a real encephalitis lethargica patient without sacrificing the realistic situation of a real person suffering from the disease. The cast showed great essence of portrayal of roles which fitted the entire system of the plot. De Niro’s portrayal of Leonard Lowe earned him the

The author of this paper will give the movie a satisfactory mark for it reached the expectations of the majority and it is above a mediocre piece. Penny Marshall directed a film that created mood swings among the viewers which resulted into multiple recognitions and praises of the movie industries around the globe. This paper elaborated the great acts made by the entire casts specifically Robert De Niro and Robin Willams. Both actors demonstrated a good set of act that even caught the eyes of world’s most prestigious film inductions. The film made it as one of the iconic films of Robin William and Robert De Niro’s career. In today’s pop culture both De Niro and Williams will be forever engraved as Leonard Lowe and Dr. Malcolm Sayer. Negative feedbacks also responded to the film such as the mediocrity of the film’s production but it can be answered by the film’s positive achievements such as being nominated in many categories in prestigious film awardings and inductions. The Awakenings was an overall good movie with superb casts, screenplay under a very relevant director