My Top 5 Hollywood Health Care Movies

As the American healthcare debate rages wildly about us, Americans are bombarded by facts, figures, opinions and those beloved long winded experts and pundits who toss them liberally around on the Sunday morning and cable news talk shows. Bill O'Reilly, Anderson Cooper, David Gregory, Keith Olbermann, Rachel Maddow, Glenn Beck, Chris Matthews and George Stephenopoulos all scream healthcare or bust! They crack healthcare jokes about the battered medical field and make us so confused, and downright exasperated, we all need to go see our own doctors for a check-up.

President Barack Obama tries to focus on bringing forth health reform, yet the political landscape looms large and is at best treacherous. For those following closely, and who isn't at least paying some attention, it appears as if we're watching a concocted Hollywood drama, where a nation's leader struggles to appease his ardent political supporters, without enraging his bitter opponents, and ultimately still do what's best for his country.

Naturally the stakes are much higher in real life, but Hollywood has indeed captured memorably powerful moments in depicting the struggles for health and health care.

John Q (2002)

This Denzel Washington drama, directed by John Cassavetes, still resonates with complex topical issues, which have made the current healthcare reform debate so complicated. Washington plays John Quincy Archibald whose son's enlarged heart threatens his life. When John Q learns the HMO won't pay for the boy's operation, he takes matters into his own hands.

Although slightly criticized for being over the top, you can't help but identify with Denzel Washington's character at least somewhat. We've all had family members or friends stricken by illness. If our loved ones were somehow shut out by a puzzling medical system so twisty it makes healthcare professionals dizzy with confusion, we'd want to take a little action ourselves. Actors James Woods, Ray Liotta, Anne Heche, Ethan Supplee and Robert Duvall all shine in the ensemble cast.

Mask (1985)

Cher plays a mother of a horribly disfigured, though always spirited boy. Based on the true story of Rocky Dennis (Eric Stolz), it's an engaging, utterly touching tribute to a disabled boy's spirit and a mother's undeniable love. Rocky has an extremely rare affliction called in slang terms lionitis, which grows the victim's facial bones large and deformed.

Lead actors Stolz and Cher enjoy a quiet chemistry and although there's no cure for Rocky's illness, he never quits living or trying to love as any other young man would. It's a health care example everyone would do well to remember and emulate.

Terms Of Endearment (1983)

Though billed mostly as a romantic comedy with Shirley MacLaine, Debra Winger, Jeff Daniels and Jack Nicholson, this James L Brooks movie is noted for its intense hospital room scene.

MacLaine plays Winger's mom. When Winger's health declines from a devastating condition, and she lies in pain in her hospital room bed, MacLaine asks if her daughter can have more pain medication. When the nurses on call aren't quick to grant the request, the lioness mother MacLaine pounces into action. I never fail to get moved by this scene, and I'm not alone. This alone makes it one of the more subtle, though powerful movies dealing with healthcare.

Robocop (1987)

Paul Verhoeven directs Peter Weller in the title role of a man turned into a machine. The movie is a sci-fi thriller, and clever satire on the state of violent crime and the law enforcement efforts to contain it. It's also a searing speculation into what may be possible with cybernetic medical technology.

After thugs brutally gun down Officer Murphy, and to all the world he dies, he's resurrected into a robot cop. Robocop shoots better, faster and with more deadly charm than a dozen or more human cops. When co-star Nancy Allen suspects that Weller's humanity is still buried down deep in that metallic battle armor suit, his dynamic performance wows us. Soon, the audience cheers his return to being human. The sci-fi fun and frolic of this movie boasts a wonderful subtext of how much we can be changed with technology. After a certain point, when does a man stop being a man and becomes artificial? One of the last lines, Robocop utters is, "Don't worry, they'll fix you. They fix everything."

Lorenzo's Oil (1992)

Based on the real lives of Augusto and Michela Odone, Nick Nolte and Susan Sarandon play a husband and wife who shun a medical world who have shunned a sick child, and end up curing the boy themselves.

The boy suffers from a rare debilitating disease and as the parents begin their own exhaustive research, they run into all sorts of roadblocks. They doggedly persist to find a treatment. By the movie's end, their son has dramatically improved enough for them to communicate with him far better than ever before. Despite real life criticism that the movie takes liberty with how fast or well the boy improved, the facts remain the oil the Odone's helped to perfect does in fact effectively treat victims of the disease. Perhaps more than any movie dealing with health care, this uplifting one gives real hope that the battle doesn't have to be lost, just because medical professionals around you say to give up.

Sources

Imdb.com

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorenzo's_Oil