Saturday, July 14, 2007

AWAKE!

On Wednesday we went with our good chums Ben and Gerrod (not Ben and Jerry, as Fred was disappointed to find) to see a test screening of a harrowing movie called 'Awake'. In the grand tradition of movies with one-letter a-words for a title (only 'Alive' comes to mind), it had a few squeamish moments.

The movie centres on a guy who goes in for a heart transplant, only to find that, yes, he is awake throughout the whole procedure. Now mum, this movie is not due to come out until November, so you can put your money away for now. It might already be out in paperback if you can't wait that long.

In the questionnaire I filled in afterwards, I specified that my least favourite scenes were: 'Guy screaming as his chest was cut open'; 'Guy screaming as his chest was clamped open'; and 'Guy sounding like he was going to throw up when they removed his heart'. I think that pretty much covered it. Now if they take note of my comments and remove those scenes, it might actually be an OK movie to see.

It makes me think that I should make a similar movie based on my own harrowing experience, called 'Not Responding to Local Anaesthetic'. Starring me and Dr Wang, and set in the Birkdale Medical Centre post-2001 (heady times).

The general plot is, Dr Wang injects me with local anaesthetic around the mole he's about to remove, but doesn't wait the prescribed length of time before operating. What follows is an hilarious mix of pain and mental anguish, as Dr Wang slices out an extraordinary amount of flesh and stiches up the wound (albeit with what turn out to be the wrong stiches).

I'll have to give it a better title though, perhaps using another a-letter word, like 'Angry', 'Anaesthetized - Not!', or another one that I won't use if mum is reading.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Despite having my eyes shut for a long period of time, and having feelings of tightness around my chest for 2 days after the film, it actually was quite a good drama/thriller- of course, a lot more went on than just the surgery bit.
I felt quite important as I filled in my survey sheet- I could definitely go for being in a test audience again.

Anonymous said...

Julian, when your movie gets made, can I come be in the test audience?

Anonymous said...

This film sounds horrendous! But how do you get to be part of a test audience, I think I would really enjoy that (with any other movie)?

Sweet Olive Press | Helen said...

No. No no no.

I can't take pain in movies. I'd be a terrible test audience for anything but, you know, sunshine and puppies and kittens in baskets.

Although I'll pretty much watch anything with John Cusack in, even his hilariously sucky 80s stuff... but not his latest one, it looks frankly terrifying.

Where was I... JULES! Why did you not STOP Dr Wang? For pity's sake! Sweep the leg or something.