Awake [HD]

3.5 Stars for a surprisingly interesting film.
Better than I had expected, but certainly not top-notch entertainment.

"Awake" is not an wholly original idea as Stephen King explored this idea in one of his short stories in which a person is mistakenly believed to be dead and is about to undergo his own autopsy. Here someone undergoes surgery while still awake and learns who his friends really are and aren't. Read the synopsis by Amazon as they did a very good and fair job. I'm going to take the real lazy way out this time and just go to my hits and misses.

Misses:

1. Too slow at points. There is a lot of exposition (with good reason), but it is still a lot of exposition.
2. The acting is not consistent. Some are terrific and others are flat.
3. So many plot twists that one just can't give this film the "willing suspension of disbelief" that it needs.
4. It moves from romance to health crisis, to scientific wonders, to absolute fantasy. It attempts to cover too many genres...

Silly
AWAKE would be better named 'audience wake up' as the minimal novel idea of the story loses credibility so quickly that the development of the subplots become increasingly tedious and silly. Joby Harold both wrote and directed this film and despite the presence of some fine actors, the film remains grounded.

Clay Beresford (Hayden Christensen) has inherited his dead father's multi-billion dollar fortune and shares the wealth and control of his empire with his domineering mother Lilith (Lena Olin). Clay apparently has a genetically determined cardiac pathology, is medicated, and awaits a heart transplant. The only semblance of honest life Clay has is his love for his mother's secretary Sam (Jessica Alba) who, despite Lilith's objections, marries Clay after disclosing their relationship. Clay's beeper warning that a cardiac donor is available cuts short their night of honeymoon and Clay is rushed to the hospital to his constant friend, Dr. Jack Harper (Terrence Howard), who...

"AWAKE" MOVIE REVIEW
Predictable. I really can't get too excited about this movie. Now anything with Jessica Alba is a "man treat" but this one really was just
average. All in all interesting and ok to watch but don't expect to be wide awake at the end.

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