Awake

Starring: Hayden Christensen, Jessica Alba, Terrence Howard, Fisher Stevens
Directed by: Joby Harold
Rating: R
Genre: Crime, Drama, Thriller
2007

Times Seen:
Tim: 1

Summary: A wealthy businessman (Hayden Christensen) is set to have a heart transplant while his girlfriend (Jessica Alba) looks on. However, on the operating table, he suffers from anesthesia awareness, a condition where he appears to be out, but he is actually awake. Awake on the operating table, he learns of a terrible plot that will result in his death, staged to look like an accident during surgery.

Review:

Tim: I can appreciate what this film was trying to be. Thrillers today have it harder than ever before, because audiences need to see new twists and turns that are unexpected and exciting. I myself love when movies give me something I've never seen before. Awake tries to give us something different, a film based around the concept of anesthesia awareness, something I was unaware of prior to this movie, and will now be scared to death of happening to me if I ever have surgery again. This real-life phenomena is scary enough, but the film needs to tell a story, so we get a quasi-believable tale of murder for money.

This movie is almost always just good enough to keep you interested, but not enough to really make an impact. The surgery scenes are fairly gruesome, but we needed more than that. We needed to really believe in these characters and buy into the story. For a number of reasons, this is difficult.

I had a hard time believing Hayden Christensen in this movie. I don't think too many people will argue that he's an incredible actor. He's not overtly terrible here, but just not as good as he needed to be. He was actually weak enough to make Jessica Alba look good. (I'm not being entirely truthful there, as Alba is pretty weak as well). Alba isn't nearly as bad as she's been in previous films, although she's by no means great. I actually enjoyed the performance of Terrence Howard. He has a knack for playing complicated characters in a sympathetic way, and he does that very well here. One of the big problems of the film are that Christensen and Alba are never entirely believable as a couple. I can think of far worse chemistry I've seen, but they aren't great, either. Even harder to believe, though, is the secretive nature of the relationship in regards to Christensen's mother. I just couldn't buy into this dynamic and it hurt my viewing experience.

The film teeters on and off from being very good and being silly. Some of the out-of-body experiences are a big much and the flashback/dream sequences can be a bit tiresome as well. However, there are some great twisting moments and legitimate suspenseful ones. Sadly, the movie tries to wrap everything up a bit too neatly, which results in an absolutely massive suspension of disbelief from the audience. I couldn't entirely do this, and I doubt many other people will be able to, either.

Awake ends up as a decent thriller- not entirely forgettable, but not nearly impactful enough. I don't have strong feelings for this film either way, as it exists is that nebulous cloud between good and bad, one of those movies you don't hate, but can't love.



Rating 1-10
Tim's Rating- 6.5



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