The Lazarus Child

I saw Lazurus Child on HBO last week and one week later, I am still impressed enough to write this review about it. At first, I was about to channel-switch as I thought it was another "Hallmark channel" type of feel-good movie when I was game for some mindless action flick. As the movie developed, I was slowly riveted.

The scene that captured me most was when the doctors tried to test if Frankie (the comatose little girl) could breathe on her own without life support. The intensity and anxiety was palpable, although I was unsure of the plot still. I even thought it was some kind of horror movie, because there were the eerie parts when the brother (Harry Eden) visited his sister in the hospital for the first time and his dog stick/staff thing was flung to the floor for no apparent reason or when he kept switching on/off the table lamp and hallucinating that his little sis was sitting in a chair with him in the room. The plot was only clear when Dr. Elizabeth Chase (Angela Bassett) was introduced and what kind of medical research she specialises in.

Acting-wise, Andy Garcia and Frances O'Connor seem to play supporting roles vis-a-vis the young boy in the role as their son. He was the highlight of the movie for me, and in my honest opinion, he's better than Haley Joel Osment. That's saying a lot because I do like the Osment boy too. The only disconcerting part of the movie for me was why Dr. Chase chose to stay behind in the 'room' - it seemed quite out of line for me because I thought she went into hypnosis so that she could bring them out as she knew they didn't know the way out.