Brain on Fire fails to bring the heat

Gerard Barrett’s film aims to bring awareness to rare disease

By Kelly Bilenkis

Published: 4:50 pm, 27 September 2016


Critics everywhere are rolling their eyes at Brain on Fire: a medical thriller based on a true story. It follows Susannah (Chloë Grace Moretz), a reporter that is repeatedly misdiagnosed as she becomes increasingly ill.
The movie’s major criticisms are as follows: inadequate development of a main character; the medical procedures shown are done in cliché; the ‘cure’ in the movie is unrealistic, discovered by a ‘genius doctor’ — a medical Ex Machina.

But Brain on Fire was never meant to be a hard-hitting film, nor had it intended on revolutionizing script and plot elements. As director Gerard Barrett admits, “There were sacrifices that I had to make, to make sure that [the disease] was understandable. And that was important to me.”

In the film, Susannah, a young and ambitious journalist, has anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis, a rare auto-immune disease where the body attacks the brain causing partial inflammation and resulting in symptoms of psychosis. The disease was discovered as recently as 2006, and is not widely discussed in medical curricula around the world, making it a unique plot point for the movie.

Filming and pre-production took about three weeks in total — a small amount of time compared to most of Hollywood’s giant blockbusters. Instead of focusing on possible stylistic choices and narrative, Barrett kept things simple. He didn’t want the plot to be complicated, nor did he want to distract the audience’s attention from anything but the disease. Barrett said he wanted the audience to “just watch it, take it in, and use it in real life.”

At the same time, though, Barrett spread himself too thin. Had Barrett struck a balance between truth and artistic vision, perhaps the film would have been better received. As noble as it seems to want to use film as a platform to raise awareness, in doing so, Barrett neglected to engage in truly creative filmmaking.

Staten Island's Dr. Souhel Najjar portrayed in 'Brain on Fire' film

Lauren Steussy | lsteussy@siadvance.com

on October 07, 2016 at 6:00 AM, updated October 07, 2016 at 10:52 AM

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. Dr. Souhel Najjar never could have imagined, in all his years of medicine and research, that one of the best moments of his career would happen on a red carpet, at an international film festival.

The parade of celebrities for the movie "Brain on Fire," about his diagnosis of a young reporter's rare autoimmune illness, was certainly not something he could have imagined growing up in Damascus, Syria, either.

Najjar, now a Staten Island University Hospital-based neurologist, was in third grade when a teacher kicked him out of Catholic school -- expelling him for a perceived mental illness.

A public school teacher took him under her wing, imparting on him one of the biggest lessons he carried into his medical career: There are some people you should never give up on.

For Najjar, that person was Susannah Cahalan, the patient he diagnosed in 2009 with autoimmune encephalitis. Cahalan went on to write a book about the harrowing experience. The book was made into a movie, "Brain on Fire," which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September.

"There was only one person who did not give up on me," Najjar said. "That's what was going through my mind: Because of that person I am here now. I made it and I'm walking on the red carpet."

Watching the movie that night, in the company of cast like Chloe Grace Moretz and Tyler Perry, brought him back to the moment when he first met Cahalan. Doctors had diagnosed her with everything from alcohol withdrawal to schizophrenia. But Najjar, who has a reputation as the "Dr. House of Staten Island," had a feeling it wasn't a psychotic condition -- he just had to listen to Cahalan.

"It took one person to save me, how can I give up on anyone?"

BRAIN ON FIRE

The film "Brain on Fire" stars Moretz as Cahalan -- a young New York Post reporter who was admitted to NYU Langone Medical Center with a series of baffling symptoms: Bedbug-bite sensations on the left side of her body, mood swings at work, seizures and hallucinations.

While many of Cahalan's doctors up to that point were looking at her medical records for clues about the source of her psychotic symptoms, Najjar took a different approach -- one he says is perfectly portrayed in "Brain on Fire."

He listened to her.

"When I met her, I held her hand and told her, 'I know you're trapped within your own body, but I'm gonna get you out.'"

As a neuropathologist in the years prior to meeting Cahalan, he studied the brains of individuals who committed suicide or were thought to have mental illnesses. Many of those brains showed signs of inflammation -- suggesting they were actually suffering from an autoimmune disorder. He had a hunch Susannah was experiencing the same.

He was right. He was able to prove to doctors that her condition was not psychiatric. It was a complicated diagnosis he made simple by telling Cahalan's parents their daughter's "brain was on fire."

When he heard those words in the film, he broke down.

"It brought back many emotions that I had filed away, and I got choked up, because it really brought me back to the moment -- that challenge to convince the medical establishment that Susannah's condition was not psychiatric in nature and was neurological."
Staten Island surgeon talks ‘Brain on Fire’ movie

THE POWER OF A WELL-TOLD STORY

That wasn't the only realistic moment in the story, either. Paul McPolin, Cahalan's Post editor at the time of her illness -- and a former Advance editor -- read the book and is anxiously awaiting a chance to see the film. Cahalan has so far portrayed the experience as it really was, McPolin said.

"Watching a perfectly normal young woman -- so talented and vivacious -- suddenly deteriorate into stark-raving lunacy, is just about the most frightening thing you can witness in life," McPolin said.

"And to see that madness tamed, that horror turned around, by a brilliant doctor, and my friend blossom into who she is today, is nothing short of a miracle. So it's a story that conveys horror and hope and resilience and love -- and it's all real."

It also brought to the public awareness some important lessons in the medical field, Najjar said.

"It highlighted the need to bridge the gap that currently exists between psychiatry and neurology," he said.

Since the book came out, he's heard from dozens of family members who believe their loved ones are suffering from a similar symptoms -- but were diagnosed with psychiatric illnesses. He expects the movie will do the same.

"Susannah's story touched many hearts and saved so many lives," Najjar said. "Through her book, and I think the movie will do the same, she has become the voice of those who cannot advocate for themselves."

Film review: Brain on Fire – Chloe Grace Moretz confronts rare brain disease in monotonous drama
Based on a true story and directed by rising Irish talent Gerard Barrett, this bland film is unlikely to spread awareness of the disease at its centre
PUBLISHED : Tuesday, 25 April, 2017, 7:01am
UPDATED : Tuesday, 25 April, 2017, 7:01am

2/5 stars

Chloe Grace Moretz ( The 5th Wave , Bad Neighbours 2 ) goes through the entire repertoire of acting crazy in Brain on Fire. The true-life medical drama is, however, less likely to bring awareness to a very rare autoimmune disorder – anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis, to be exact – than it is to be consumed as a low-rent imitator of Safe, Todd Haynes’ 1995 parable about an American woman suffering from an unidentifiable debilitating illness.

Life seems splendid for recent university graduate Susannah (Moretz), who is working her “dream job” as a New York Post reporter alongside a fun colleague (Jenny Slate) and a supportive editor (Tyler Perry); in a cosy relationship with an aspiring musician boyfriend (Thomas Mann); and enjoying the liberty of living apart from her divorced parents (Richard Armitage and Carrie-Anne Moss). But everything changes one day when she begins to zone in and out involuntarily.

What starts out as occasional episodes of hazy perception soon give way to a constant struggle with insomnia, paranoia, mood swings, hallucinations and seizures. While everyone shows her unconditional love and care, Susannah’s ordeal appears to attain a metaphysical edge when doctor after doctor fails to diagnose the disease troubling the young woman, who ends up in hospital, catatonic.

Then a late twist arrives – just before she’s sent to a psychiatric ward! – with a good doctor and his right diagnosis, and we don’t even get to see Susannah’s recovery before the abrupt happy ending. It is no spoiler to say that because this film, directed by promising Irish filmmaker Gerard Barrett ( Glassland ), is based on the bestselling memoir by Susannah Cahalan, who has obviously survived to tell the tale. It’s just a shame the adaptation is so uncompromisingly bland.

Movie Review: Brain On Fire (PG13)

Charmaine Soh

May 03, 2017 06:00 am


This biographical drama film was really inspiring and fascinating to watch.

It's about a young, ambitious journalist, Susannah Cahalan (Chloë Grace Moretz), who mysteriously develops erratic behaviour and does not understand what is happening to her.

But a fortunate intervention by one doctor helps her rebuild her life. Much of the storyline portrays her battle with the disorder and the film takes its time to develop the disorder's different stages.

From instantaneous mood swings to seizures that felt truly genuine, Moretz grasped all the right emotions and physical expressions and I was wowed by how well she did it.

I really liked that this is one of those rare films that help spread awareness of a disease which many wouldn't have heard of.

But despite my appreciation for learning something new, I thought it was a rushed ending because the doctor who changed everything only appeared towards the end of the film.

Brain on Fire (2017) – Review
4 May, 2017 2:37 pm | Jedd Jong

Director : Gerard Barrett

Cast : : Chloe Grace Moretz, Jenny Slate, Thomas Mann, Carrie-Anne Moss, Richard Armitage, Tyler Perry

Genre : Biography/Drama

Run Time : 1h 30min

Opens : 4 May 2017

Rating : PG13

While there’s the niggling vibe of an illness-of-the-week Lifetime TV movie here, 'Brain on Fire' is mostly moving and the right amount of unsettling.


In this biopic/medical drama, Chloë Grace Moretz finds her life spinning out of control, and she doesn’t know what’s causing it. Moretz plays Susannah Cahalan, a 21-year-old reporter for the New York Post. Susannah befriends her colleague Margo (Slate), and her stern but fair boss Richard (Perry) views her as a rising star in the bullpen. She’s dating a sweet aspiring musician named Steven (Mann), and all seems to be going well. Suddenly, with no prior history of mental illness, Susannah suffers a breakdown, starts hallucinating and having seizures. Her divorced parents Tom (Armitage) and Rhona (Moss) are understandably worried for her, as various diagnoses come back inconclusive. With not just her job but her life threatened by this mysterious condition, only neurologist Dr. Souhel Najjar (Navid Negahban) might be able to get to the bottom of Susannah’s circumstance.

Brain on Fire is based on the memoir of the same name by the real-life Susannah Cahalan. Charlize Theron optioned the film rights and dropped out of a supporting role, but remained onboard as a producer. Any film that deals with a rare illness, particularly one which affects the mind, is in danger of being manipulative. Writer-director Gerard Barrett succumbs to the tropes one often sees in movies or TV shows in which characters suffer mental breakdowns. However, he strikes a fine balance of making the audience uncomfortable by depicting the harrowing effects of anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis, while refraining from making things exploitative. Brain on Fire often feels like the ‘Hollywood version’ of Susannah’s experience, but it’s engaging and sufficiently credible even as it feels a little overwrought.

One of the themes that drives the story is the feeling of powerlessness that a young person can have when stepping into the adult world. Susannah is fresh out of college, and initially attributes her symptoms to simply being overwhelmed. Irish writer-director Barrett is himself young and successful – this is the 29-year-old’s third feature film. Upon finding out Barrett’s age, a sense of ennui washed over this reviewer. The story takes place in New York City, arguably one of the worst places in the world to suffer from a sudden mental breakdown. Unfortunately, Vancouver doesn’t do the best job of doubling for the Big Apple in this case, especially because Brain on Fire doesn’t quite convey the overwhelming sensory stimulus of New York City.

Dakota Fanning was originally cast in the role of Susannah, with scheduling conflicts leading to Moretz replacing her. Moretz’s bubbly demeanour makes Susannah a pleasant protagonist to begin with, which means it’s easier with the audience to stick with her as she experiences the crushing lows and unsettling delirium that she does. It’s a fine performance, but as one would expect, also a showy one. It’s easy to overplay struggling with an affliction physical or mental, with the unfortunate implication over the years being that if actors want to win awards, they’ll play characters who are stricken with grave illnesses. What helps mitigate this cynicism is the knowledge that Susannah Cahalan is a real person, who had to sign off on this portrayal of her. Even if Moretz’s acting borders on over-the-top, she keeps Susannah feeling like an actual person as she rides the frightening roller coaster that is anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis.

The supporting cast is fine, but each character falls to neatly into boxes labelled with their archetypes. Mann’s Steven is the dopey, devoted boyfriend – he seems a better fit for the role than the initially-cast Will Poulter. Slate’s Margo is the upbeat friend from work, while Perry’s Richard is more or less Laurence Fishburne as Perry White in the DC Extended Universe movies. It’s not a huge role, but Perry gets to show that he has decent acting chops when he’s not in anything he writes or directs. As the concerned parents, Armitage and Moss don’t get too much to do, and Armitage wrestling with his accent is more than a little distracting.

While it is heart-rending to watch Susannah go through hell as her loved ones are rendered helpless, the parts of the film that deal with the medical theory are somewhat more interesting. Barrett is conscious that too much jargon might bore audiences. As such, Negahban’s warmth and quiet intelligence is greatly welcome. The film highlights how much harm misdiagnoses can be – it’s estimated that only 10% of people who have anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis were properly diagnosed at the time.

As heartless as it sounds, Susannah Cahalan’s ordeal is far from the most dramatic or extreme true story to be brought to the big screen. However, this movie is important in its own way. While the specifics feel embellished slightly, with the romantic and workplace comedy elements of the film too obvious, Moretz’s performance holds one’s attention.

Summary: While there’s the niggling vibe of an illness-of-the-week Lifetime TV movie here, Brain on Fire is mostly moving and the right amount of unsettling.

RATING: 3.5 out of 5 Stars

‘Brain on Fire’ Plays Like An Episode of ‘House’ Without House

Did Lifetime reject this well-intended but dull movie as a pilot?


By Douglas Tseng
04 May 2017 16:59
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Brain on Fire (PG13)

Starring Chloë Grace Moretz, Richard Armitage, Jenny Slate

Directed by Gerard Barrett

A young reporter (Chloë Grace Moretz) starts behaving erratically, but her doctor doesn’t seem to know what the cause is. He chalks her condition up to stress at work and her wild partying ways. (Or maybe she’s possessed by a demon?)

This sounds like an episode of House, except there’s no curmudgeonly Dr Gregory House limbing into the room, throwing sarcastic insults and cracking inappropriate remarks.

Carrie Anne-Moss and Richard Armitage co-star as the patient’s parents in a drama that has all the excitement of a rejected pilot for a Lifetime medical show.

Movie Review: Brain on Fire (Netflix)
June 22, 2018 Sidney Morgan

BRAIN ON FIRE

Starring: Chloë Grace Moretz, Thomas Mann, Richard Armitage, Carrie-Anne Moss, Jenny Slate, Tyler Perry
Director: Gerard Barrett
Writer: Gerard Barrett (screenplay), Susannah Cahalan (memoir)

Reviewed by Sidney Morgan

This review CONTAINS SOME SPOILERS.

The human body is a phenomenal piece of evolutionary marvel. Want to move forward? No conscious though needed, yet the electrical stimulus to make sure both legs move while maintaining balance is sent and baring a clumsy or clutzy moment. Voilà, you’re walking. And though incredible advances have been made to understand it, so much is still unknown, especially when it comes to matters of the brain. So when something does go wrong, we are left to look on helplessly at its oft ravaging effects, waiting for an explanation.

Brain on Fire, based on Susannah Cahalan’s memoir Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness stars Chloë Grace Moretz as Susannah. A woman whose life takes a serious stumble as she suddenly begins to experience inexplicable erratic behaviours. She’s a vibrant, young 21-year-old woman who lives in New York City. She’s working at her dream job as a writer for the New York Post. She meets Stephen (Thomas Mann), a young man whose own dream is to become a musician. But her happiness is cut short as she begins to suffer seizures, memory loss, and delusions among other symptoms. What follows is a journey into her condition, which worsens with every passing day. Standing helplessly by her side are her mother and father, who are divorced, as well as her boyfriend, Stephen.

Whether you enjoy the movie depends entirely on the approach, you take watching it. This isn’t a movie about the search for a cure like in Lorenzo’s Oil. Nor is it about alternative ways to make patients feel better as Robin Williams did in Patch Adams. It isn’t about a miracle drug as in Awakenings. There certainly aren’t any supernatural occurrences as in Flatliners. Brain on Fire is about Susannah and her terrifying journey from being a fun, joyful young woman, to a catatonic patient in a hospital. A woman whose life is slowly drifting away due to a lack of proper diagnosis. It’s also about the helplessness of love ones unable to help. They try to support her while fighting a rigid medical system to do more and find the cause of her illness.

The movie is also an indictment against parts of the medical system. When Susannah begins to see her doctor, he’s perplexed as all of her physical signs point to a perfectly healthy young woman. Instead of digging deeper, he simply diagnoses her as lacking sleep and drinking too much (though she tells him specifically she has perhaps one drink per night). He’s “seen this so many times before.” When the parents get involved, he sings them the same song. After all the tests at the hospital, knowing they have no idea what is going on. The team of doctors try to brush her condition away as a psychiatric one. It takes angry parents pushing for the truth for them to finally admit they have no clue what’s wrong with Susannah. How many other people are misdiagnosed?

Chloë Grace Moretz gives a brilliant performance as Susannah. Her metronome like transformation from manic to calm, from joyous to depressed, from grasping her reality to being delusional is well done, and frankly frightening, as this actually happened. She’s been fun to watch in previous movies, and Brain on Fire is no exception. Without this kind of performance, the movie wouldn’t have worked as the supporting cast, which is made up of well-known actors, gave mixed ones.

I was disappointed in the portrayal of Susannah’s family. Richard Armitage is a good actor. I liked him in The Hobbit, as well as in Berlin Station, but portraying a distraught father wasn’t his forte. There was one touching scene between him and Thomas Mann (Stephan) but was better at showing anger and defiance. Carrie-Anne Moss, great in other works, including The Matrix, was too calm and too detached, never really showing the devastating toll this took on her. Perhaps I’m biased because I love The Exorcist. Ellen Burstyn’s outstanding and emotionally charged reaction to her daughter’s complete change in behaviour felt real and believable.

Thomas Mann was good as the ‘stand-by-you-through-thick-and-thin’ boyfriend. Trying to reach her through his music was well done. I was on the fence with Tyler Perry, who was a caricature of J. Jonah Jamison (he was missing the cigar), but also showed kind moments when he worried about Susannah. Standing out among them was Jenny Slate’s performance as Margo, Susannah’s colleague who looks out for her like an older sister would. Her visit to the hospital is one of the rawest scenes in the movie and highlighted the full impact of Susannah’s condition.

Verdict: WATCH IT.

Brain on Fire is a one man’s interpretation of Susannah Cahalan’s rapid descent from vibrant, youthful optimism to a catatonic state. It isn’t the first movie, nor the best, that tries to give viewers a glimpse of some affliction’s impact on its victim and their loved ones. But Chloë Grace Moretz’s performance alone is a reason to watch. Just don’t expect a story about anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis (Susannah’s affliction), nor about its cure. This is Susannah’s story.
Sidney Morgan

Brain on Fire
Movie review by Renee Schonfeld, Common Sense Media

2/5

age 13+
Brain condition ravages young reporter's life; swearing.

PG-13 2018 95 minutes

Common Sense is a nonprofit organization. Your purchase helps us remain independent and ad-free.
A lot or a little?
The parents' guide to what's in this movie.

What parents need to know

Parents need to know that Brain on Fire is a based on Susannah Cahalan's same-named memoir. As a talented young reporter on the staff of the NY Post, Cahalan (Chloe Grace Moretz) begins exhibiting unusual behavior and experiencing strange physical symptoms. With no diagnosis apparent, she and her loved ones are left without hope of recovery ... until the arrival of a brilliant doctor who refuses to give up. Cahalan's behavior is volatile at times; she's out of control and subject to violent seizures. Swearing includes use of "s--t," "ass," " hell," and "d--k." A young couple kisses and embraces; it's implied that they've slept together. In one humorous scene, a young man is nude, his genitals covered by the guitar he plays. Both the memoir and the film were created in the hopes of educating the public about anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis, a rare autoimmune disorder.


What's the story?

Susannah Cahalan (Chloe Grace Moretz) has everything to look forward to in BRAIN ON FIRE. Celebrating her 21st birthday with her divorced parents, Tom (Richard Armitage) and Rhona (Carrie-Anne Moss) and Stephen (Thomas Mann), the young man she's fallen in love with, is wonderful. Her "cub" reporter job at the NY Post is everything she hoped it would be. Nothing has prepared the bright young woman for the tragedy that is about to transpire. An onslaught of strange behavior -- sometimes manic, sometimes depressed, as well as sounds magnified and voices besieging her -- are troublesome at first and then cannot be ignored. Violent seizures follow. And though she tries to minimize the condition and carry on, the behavior escalates, soon becoming out of control. Her loving parents are close at her side, as is Stephen, but thorough medical examinations and hospital visits cannot stop the family's growing desperation. Only when it appears that there's no medical explanation for Susannah's condition and that she may have to be admitted to a psychiatric hospital for an indeterminate time does one special doctor join the medical team and refuse to give up.

Is it any good?

Kudos to the real-life Susannah Cahalan and the creative team for bringing a little-known but harrowing medical condition to light, but the movie as a dramatic film simply doesn't stand up. A good portion of Brain on Fire is devoted to Susannah's behavior and growing anguish as her rare brain disorder takes hold. It really happened. But watching sequence after sequence of an assault on her mind by sounds, voices, and increasingly erratic behavior in the workplace and at home becomes repetitious and even the chilling seizures lose their impact. Chloe Grace Moretz does the best she can with this grown-up role after a series of resounding successes as a child and teen actress. Supporting players are fine but are given little to play beyond the situation at hand. Still, if what the final words that appear on screen are true, Cahalan's memoir has had a major impact on diagnoses of anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis, and that's a remarkable outcome.

Talk to your kids about ...

Families can talk about the differences between telling a true story in documentary form and telling that story in a fictionalized version with actors and scripted dialogue. Which are you most likely to watch? Why? Do you think fictionalizing a true story invites a wider audience?

In making a fictional film based on a true story like Brain on Fire, there are always some liberties that must be taken. For example, no one has written down dialogue from a scene that actually took place; it has to be "re-created." How much license are you comfortable with? Where might you go to get more detailed true information?

Susannah Cahalan wrote a book (memoir) about her illness, so if you were aware that it was a true story, you knew that it would end well. Does knowing how a film will resolve spoil the experience of viewing it? What makes a film "journey" enjoyable despite its predictability?

What character strengths did Susannah exhibit in this film? Her parents? Stephen? Why were these qualities essential for Susannah's recovery?

Brain on Fire Review
By David Duprey On Jun 24, 2018

3,5/5

Brain on Fire is a 2018 biographical drama about a young, capable professional who cannot explain her newly erratic behavior.

The true story of reporter Susannah Cahalan is a fascinating, if not terribly worrisome, the young woman at the center of rare medical condition that baffled nearly everyone – including doctors – around her. With Gerard Barrett‘s latest effort, based on Cahalan’s book of her ordeal, we are introduced to the troubling breakdown that left her in a frightful spiral, but the film, despite a solid lead performance, is all too superficial in its investigation of her condition, greatly missing an opportunity to make this a far more profoundly moving experience.

Twenty-four-year-old Susan Cahalan (Chloë Grace Moretz) has her dream job as a young reporter for the New York Post, settling into the big city with new boyfriend Stephen (Thomas Mann), himself a burgeoning musician. She’s doing well in her job, making friends with seasoned investigator Margo (Jenny Slate) and making headway with editor Richard (Tyler Perry). However, she’s been feeling a little strange of late suffering from small headaches, blurred vision, memory lapses, over sleeping … stuff she doesn’t take too seriously until she train wrecks an important interview with a senator. This eventually leads to a seizure and finally a visit to a hospital where doctors put her through a series of rigorous tests but remain unable to figure out what’s wrong, thinking perhaps it’s schizophrenia. This puts her divorced parents Rhona (Carrie-Anne Moss) and Tom (Richard Armitage) into a tailspin of their own, struggling to find out what’s happening and what to do with their daughter.

At about 88-minutes, Brain on Fire is decidedly thin in its development of who Susan is, putting a bulk of the film’s weight on Susan’s numerous increasingly-troubling episodes, most of which occur at work where she soon spirals into a chaotic mess. Admittedly, Moretz does what she can, shifting between bouts of emotional swings and outright drop-to-the-floor spasms, hoping to give Susan’s affliction some depth and meaning. However, the film is never as deeply an engrossing experience as it feel it could be, dutifully clinging to many tropes of the medical malady genre, moving from one scene to the other in an almost obligatory fashion.

There are some genuinely good moments that shine, with good work from Slate as a confused mentor and both Moss and Armitage beefing up the drama when the screenplay allows them. However, Barratt is more interested in the calamity of Susan’s wild swings, focusing a lot of attention on the breakdown, which assuredly has its due place, but the film is weakened by its tepid approach. It’s not until the last fifteen or so minutes when we finally get to meet Dr. Najjar (Navid Negahban, in a terrific performance), who arrives with some turn in the diagnosis, something I wish had been come upon much earlier. His exploration and treatment of Susan are easily the most fascinating of the story and should have been the core pillar of the film.

Brain on Fire condenses much into its short runtime, stripping away what might have been a more gripping examination of its subject. Think of Penny Marshall‘s deeply moving 1990 biographical drama Awakenings, which put the emphasis on the doctor/patient relationship rather than the long set up to what led them together. It’s a little unfair, I know, to compare as such, but it illustrates where Brain on Fire might have been a more compelling film. As it is, we get a straight-forward, textbook movie that offers very little behind the curtain of what was surely a truly harrowing experience.

Netflixable? Chloe Grace Moretz is a reporter suffering from a mystery illness in “Brain on Fire”
Posted on June 22, 2018 by rogerinorlando


They used to be called “disease of the week,” melodramas about some heroine or hero fighting a strange, usually deadly illness filmed and consigned to the weak midweek time-slots of network TV.

Not all of them migrated to Lifetime.

“Brain on Fire” didn’t get theatrical release, even though at one time Charlize Theron was slated to do it. It still attracted a solid B-list cast, now headed by Chloe Grace Moretz, and made it to the Toronto Film Festival after completion. And now it’s on Netflix.

Susannah Cahalan (Moretz) is barely done narrating her pleasure at having “my dream job at the New York Post,” at 21 (the real Cahalan was a slightly-more-realistic 24), just finished joking around with her more worldly colleague (Jenny Slate) who calls her “”So bright-eyed I need major sunglasses right now,” with the “get OUTTA my office” gruff-bemused bark of her editor (Tyler Perry) ringing in her ears when it hits her.

She zones out at her 21st birthday party. She glazes over, lies to cover, confesses to “not being myself,” and coughs — a lot.

Before she knows it, she is “trapped in your own body, lost in your own mind.”

Her musician-boyfriend (Thomas Mann, oh so bland) doesn’t quite take her symptoms seriously.

“Hungover? You’re not PREGNANT, are you?”

In interviews, she seems stoned. Colleagues tease her, but the camera captures “concern.” Of course it does. That doesn’t keep her editor from blowing his stack (Well played, Mr. Perry).

And thus begins the medical mystery — bed bugs, “any history of Lyme Disease?” “Stroke? “Blood clot?” “MRI?”

Filmmaker Gerard Barrett visualizes her growing confusion, sleepless madness and isolation. She sweats, freaks out at the slightest noise and then…convulsions.

The film limits itself to the alarm any of us would feel when we don’t know what’s happening. Meltdowns from her divorced parents (“Do you CARE for her, or not?”), pushing the live-in beau aside, mass confusion and the ripple effects of this disruption — to her life, her love, her career, her family — all are staged with a kind of perfunctory chilliness.

Carrie Anne Moss, playing her mother, plays the most interesting variation of concern. She probes, suspects her child is doing that overwhelmed/stressed-out/flip-out thing she might have seen before. Maybe she’s drinking. Maybe drugs. And then, another seizure and focused, fretful mom kicks in — never quite matching her ex’s (Richard Armitage) testy impatience with the medical establishment.

The lack of answers makes one and all a little crazy, and from the reactions from her family you wonder just what they’ve seen in her behavior before.

There’s a puzzling passivity that plays out among almost everybody else, right up to the moment Cahalan just…loses it. Moretz takes this so far over the bipolar top in these moments you cannot believe the white-suited guys with the straight-jackets aren’t called.

That’s when “Brain on Fire” loses its footing in reality. Colleagues take her tirade indulgently and seriously. Seriously? After that “performance?””

“I’m bipolar.”

“How do you know that?”

“I Googled it.”

Moretz has been an actress to watch since playing the too-wise, supportive little sister in “(500) Days of Summer,” the worldwise female friend of the “Wimpy Kid” crowd and then Hit-Girl to Nic Cage’s Big Daddy in “Kick-Ass.”

This role probably calls for her least subtle work, and we never for a second see this as anything other than a performance. It contrasts too much with the calmly passive-even- after-they’re-scared-witless parents (Armitage’s tirades notwithstanding).

The one “funny” element to the character is her determination to self-diagnose. Susannah corrects every medical professional who offers an opinion with this or that new theory that she’s certain is fact. She keeps Googling.

Barrett doesn’t save Moretz with more effects and moments that show her mania from inside her head. It’s all externals, vexing seizures, tantrums and manic outbursts. Something more like “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly” might have worked.

And the script doesn’t help her by creating more empathy for Cahalan, more connection with parents, boyfriend and medical professionals (unsympathetic, many of them). It all feels so perfunctory, a string of characters with no “arc.”

Compare this to “The Big Sick” or “Lorenzo’s Oil” or any of a legion of similar films, and the emotional disconnect sticks in the craw. Best selling memoir or not, it’s probable that this story, where the mania needs a softer edge, where the confrontations between parents and the Medical Establishment are the real drama, was not really good fodder for a feature film, “disease of the week” or not.

1half-star

MPAA Rating:PG-13 for thematic elements, brief language and partial nudity

Cast: Chloe Grace Moretz, Jenny Slate, Thomas Mann, Tyler Perry, Carrie-Ann Moss, Navid Negahban

Credits:Directed by Gerard Barrett, script by Gerard Barrett, based on the Susannah Cahalan memoir. A Broadgreen/Netflix release.

Running time: 1:29

Stream It or Skip It: ‘Brain on Fire’ on Netflix Puts Chloe Grace Moretz Through the Wringer

By
sirben -
June 22, 2018 56


Netflix’s latest, Brain on Fire, stars Chloe Grace Moretz in a movie about a young woman who’s brain appears to be under siege. Based on the real-life story of journalist Susannah Cahalen, the film — produced in part by Charlize Theron — offers its lead actress ample opportunities to dig into a fraught and suffering character. In the right kind of film, it’s a great showcase for an actress. In the wrong kind of film, it could be a disaster. Which way does the wind blow for this one?

BRAIN ON FIRE: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: Susannah Cahalen (Moretz) is an ambitious young reporter at the New York Post when she starts to come down with strange symptoms. Head fuzziness, numbness, lack of concentration, sleepless nights, all which eventually give way to things like hearing voices and seizures. She deep-sixes her job at the Post, despite concerned editors (Tyler Perry) and co-workers (Jenny Slate), and her divorced parents (Carrie-Ann Moss and Richard Armitage) and boyfriend (Thomas Mann) don’t know how to help her either. Initially suspected to be everything from exhaustion (you know how those young girls like to party) to bipolar disorder to schizophrenia, Susannah continues to struggle, eventually falling into a catatonic state before doctors can dig deep and figure out the real cause of her illness.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: The problem with Brain on Fire is that it’s halfway reminiscent of a lot of different movies, because it’s never quite sure who it needs its protagonist to be. Initially, the film plays like The Exorcist if all the doctors telling Regan that she was suffering from a brain disorder were right. You halfway expect her to start floating in her bed at some point. Later, the film becomes about Susannah desperately trying to convince the people in her life that she’s really sick. There’s a touch of Todd Haynes’ Safe in there as Susannah appears to be aggressed by everything in her life as an unseen and unknown ailment ravages at her. But later, as Susannah disappears further into whatever brain disorder she has, the film’s perspective shifts to her loved ones and her doctors. Here’s where things start to feel like an episode of House or those old disease-of-the-week TV movies. It takes some really strong, Sarandon-in-Lorenzo’s-Oil-level acting to carry a movie like this and make it feel cinema-worthy, and nobody in Brain on Fire is working on that level, unfortunately. And so with the character we thought was our anchor gone, the film drifts away from the audience just at the point when it should be its most compelling.

Performance Worth Watching: This space should be reserved for Chloe Grace Moretz, as she’s getting a huge showcase her abilities. The story even writes her a bit of a blank check to go over the top, given her diagnoses. But though the script and direction aren’t much help either, Moretz falls well short of making her character feel compelling in the early, pre-symptom stages or feel real once the disease really takes ahold of her. The best performance in the film comes from the perpetually underrated Carrie-Ann Moss, as Susannah’s mother. She’s an oasis of quietly controlled fear and concern that is a welcome relief given how crazed Moretz’s acting feels.

Memorable Dialogue: This is the kind of script that depicts Susannah’s manic and depressive episodes by having her say “I’m so happy” and “I’m unhappy,” so that’s not good. And there is some perfunctory, YA-esque narration going on as well, which feels very much like a studio note from someone who’d just seen The Fault in Our Stars. So this is not a super well-written movie over all. In other circumstances, having the doctor who ultimately makes the correct diagnosis whisper to the catatonic Susannah “I found you” would be unbearably cheesy, but here, it’s at least a welcome emotional spike.

Single Best Shot: Given everything else in this movie that feels unconvincing, I have to give it up to one shot in the middle of the film that feels genuinely unsettling. Home alone amid her mother’s (gorgeous, Nancy Meyers-worthy) kitchen, a visibly agitated Susannah begins slicing an orange. Given everything we know about her mental state, it is incredibly stressful watching her use an intimidatingly sharp chef’s knife to carve so uncarefully into this fruit. It’s the most suspenseful and best scene of the movie.

Our Take: It’s a wonder that every screenwriter in America hasn’t written some version of this movie after a bad experience with an inattentive doctor or a misdiagnosis. That kind of frustration is nearly universal. Yet Brain on Fire never communicates that frustration all that well to the audience. This one falls short on pretty much every level, from the acting to the pacing to the tone. It’s the kind of movie that does a billion little irritating things that add up to something worse. It’s the kind of movie where the significance of the title isn’t revealed until the end, at which point we’re so past beyond caring. It’s the kind of movie where the underdeveloped boyfriend character is a musician because the real-life boyfriend was a musician, even though that doesn’t end up adding anything to the film. In the end, this is a movie where the villain ends up being a disease no one knew was there until the final 10 minutes. You keep waiting for the movie to be about something else as well: a rallying family, a young woman struggling for respect in her field, something. In the end, we remain waiting.

Our Call: Skip It. There’s a reason this waited two years since its Toronto premiere to make it to American audiences.

Kritik der FILMSTARTS-Redaktion

1,5
enttäuschend

Feuer im Kopf
Von Manuel Berger

Mit ihrer Bestseller-Autobiografie „Feuer im Kopf“ schuf die Journalistin Susannah Cahalan 2012 Aufmerksamkeit für eine bis dato kaum bekannte Krankheit: Anti-NMDA-Rezeptor-Enzephalitis, bei der sich der Körper gleichsam selbst vernichtet, indem er das Gehirn „bekämpft“. Eine Diagnose ist oft nur möglich, wenn gezielt nach diesem seltenen Leiden gesucht wird, weshalb Betroffenen – so zumindest der Tenor in Gerard Barretts Verfilmung von Cahalans Buch – oft völlige physische Gesundheit und bei schlimmer werdenden Symptomen schließlich eine psychische Störung attestiert wird. Die Auserzählung des kontinuierlichen Verfalls eines Menschen ist prädestiniert für eindringliche Schauspielerleistungen, die gerne mit Auszeichnungen bedacht werden. Kein Wunder, dass sich mit Charlize Theron eine namhafte Darstellerin als Produzentin die Filmrechte an der Geschichte sicherte und „Feuer im Kopf“ zumindest auf dem Papier gut besetzt ist. Tatsächlich ist das Drama aber ein Reinfall und eher ein Kandidat für die Goldene Himbeere als für den Oscar. Da hilft auch die hehre Aufklärungsintention nicht viel.

Susannah (Chloë Grace Moretz) steht am Anfang einer vielversprechenden Karriere als Journalistin bei der New York Post – ihr Traumjob. Auch im Privatleben läuft es gut, denn sie ist frisch verliebt in den Musiker Stephen (Thomas Mann). Doch gerade als ihr Chef Richard (Tyler Perry) sie mit verantwortungsvolleren Aufgaben als bisher betraut, werfen plötzliche Anfälle, Halluzinationen, generelle Ermattung und Stimmungsschwankungen Susannah aus der Bahn. Verschiedene Ärzte bescheinigen ihr trotzdem, sie sei kerngesund und sehen als Ursache eine ungute Kombination aus Stress und Partys. Doch Susannahs Zustand verschlechtert sich immer weiter…

Man merkt dem Film durchaus an, dass Regisseur Gerard Barrett („Glassland“) sich an intensiven Krankheitsdramen wie Todd Haynes‘ „Safe“ oder „Die Entdeckung der Unendlichkeit“ von James Marsh orientiert hat. Er bemüht sich um eine seriöse Aufarbeitung von Susannahs Leiden, hält sich aber zu sehr mit den Symptomen auf. Er zeichnet vor allem ein Krankheitsbild, während Haynes und Marsh ihr Hauptaugenmerk auf die von dem Leiden betroffenen Menschen richten, wobei sie beide auch von außergewöhnlichen Schauspielerleistungen profitieren. Barrett dagegen, der auch das Drehbuch zu „Feuer im Kopf“ verfasst hat, verleiht seinen Figuren nicht genügend Substanz und so können die Zuschauer kaum einen emotionalen Bezug zu ihnen herstellen.

Hauptdarstellerin Chloë Grace Moretz („Kick-Ass“) wiederum scheint das Versäumnis ihres Regisseurs im Alleingang ausgleichen zu wollen, indem sie die leidende Susannah mit größtmöglicher Intensität verkörpert. Dabei überspannt sie allerdings wiederholt den Bogen und strapaziert mit extremem Overacting mehr als einmal die Geduld des Publikums. Dass ihre Bemühungen zuweilen unbeholfen wirken, liegt aber auch ganz entscheidend daran, dass die Frage „Wer ist diese Susannah eigentlich?“ von Barrett geflissentlich ignoriert wird, und Moretz daher mehr oder weniger im luftleeren Raum agiert. Damit wirkt sie deutlich überfordert: Jede Bewegung, jeder Gesichtsausdruck und jedes Wort fällt übertrieben aus, wobei ihr alsbald die Ideen auszugehen scheinen und sie immer wieder die gleichen Grimassen schneidet.

Abgesehen von harten Fakten – ambitionierte Zeitungsjournalistin, in einer Beziehung, getrennte Eltern – erfahren wir nichts über die Protagonistin. Stattdessen beginnt Barrett bereits nach fünf Minuten eine schier endlose Aneinanderreihung von Szenen, die den Verfall der jungen Protagonistin veranschaulichen. Die von Müdigkeit geplagte junge Susannah läuft orientierungslos durch die Stadt, die unter Stimmungsschwankungen leidende Susannah hüpft auf den Bürotisch und schreit ihre Kollegen an, und die inzwischen auch paranoide Susannah versucht nach der Einlieferung ins Krankenhaus mehrere Personen dazu zu überreden, sie wieder hinauszuschmuggeln.

In solchen überdramatisierten Krankheitsszenen sehen wir eine junge Frau, die längst von der Gehirnentzündung und ihren Folgen beherrscht wird, aber da wir die gesunde Susannah nicht kennengelernt haben, können wir ihr Verhalten weder richtig einschätzen noch wirklich mit ihr mitleiden. Die Figur ist vollkommen unausgereift und auch Richard Armitage („Der Hobbit“) und Carrie-Anne Moss („Matrix“) bekommen in ihren Nebenrollen als Susannahs Eltern kein besseres Material. Sie definieren sich über Aussagen wie „Wir müssen stark sein“ und „Ich brauche dich, Susannah braucht dich“.

Mit seiner eindimensionalen und bisweilen effekthascherischen Inszenierung (vor allem die Musik und ihr Einsatz drücken klischeehaft und manipulativ auf die Tränendrüse) wirkt das Ganze oft eher wie eine schlechte Seifenoper als wie ein prominent besetzter Hollywood-Kinofilm und es gipfelt in einer mit Zeitlupe aufgebauschten Verfolgungsjagd durchs Hospital. Angesichts der zu Beginn ausführlich zelebrierten Verschlimmerung der Krankheit wirken die letzten Wendungen des Films dann noch einmal besonders wenig nachvollziehbar und wie auf dem Weg dahin auch noch Ärzte dämonisiert werden, gibt dem Film dann auch eine ärgerliche Note.

Fazit: „Feuer im Kopf“ basiert auf einer tragischen Geschichte. Doch von dieser Tragik landet bei diesem emotionslosen, eindimensionalen und effekthascherischen Drama nur sehr wenig auf der Leinwand beziehungsweise auf dem Bildschirm.

Entertainment

Netflix's Latest Movie Will Have You Completely Paranoid And Googling Every Single Headache
"Brain on Fire"is based on a true story that you won't believe!

Kailie Annetts · 2 days ago

If you're still looking for something new on Netflix, you need to move the mouse to the search bar and look up "Brain on Fire."

The film that debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2016 has just been released on Netflix Canada and it is honestly the must-watch movie of this year.

The movie tells the story of a 21-year-old journalist working at the New York Post. Everything is going well in her life: she loves her job, her boss gives her new responsibilities, plus her love life and family are doing well.

Then one day, she begins to feel strange and has severe headaches. Gradually, her case worsens and issues arise at work and with loved ones. The problem? No doctor can find what she is suffering from.

When you begin watching the movie you think that she has brain cancer and will spend the next 95 minutes with tears in your eyes. On the contrary! This is a crazy thriller that keeps you from breathing for an hour and a half.

The craziest thing about this is that the story of Susannah Cahalan, performed by Chloë Grace Moretz, is true! There are even photos of Cahalan beside the actress.


As for the medical case Cahalan suffers from, it would say too much about the plot of the film but is a super interesting read after you've watched the movie.

"Brain on Fire" got a bad score on Rotten Tomatoes (15%) and 66% on IMDb, but 92% of Google users said they liked the movie. Moretz was extremely accurate and credible in her role making the recommendation of the feature film a perfect suggestion to those who like the popular content generally offered by Netflix.

Brain on Fire Review
Brain on Fire interrupts a compelling forensic medical mystery for a mediocre movie.

Review Alec Bojalad
Jul 1, 2018


This is a spoiler-free review.

The louder a film insists it’s based on real events, the more insecure it seems. It like the movie knows it doesn’t have the goods and wants to remind you that this all really happened so don’t be too mean to the characters involved or point out unrealistic dialogue or plot holes.

Brain on Fire’s opening credits scream “BASED ON REAL EVENTS” as loud as they possibly can.

Brain on Fire, based on the memoir of the same name by Susannah Cahalan, is about one woman and the mysterious illness that terrorizes her. The woman is Cahalan, herself (played by ChloëGrace Moretz), a young, energetic journalist who works at The New York Post and spends her days dreaming up satisfyingly New York Post-ian headlines about illegal butt injections.

She has solid relationships with her coworker Margo (Jenny Slate), her boss Richard (Tyler Perry), her sort-of boyfriend Stephen (Thomas Mann) and her improbably attractive parents Tom and Rhona (The Hobbit’s Richard Armitage and our old Canadian friend Carrie-Anne Moss, who we really need to see a lot of more of).

Susannah is your typical New York working millennial, healthy and happy, until one day she’s no longer healthy.

There’s been a long, well-tread critical motif that looks at inanimate objects or concepts in films and television as characters. Before it was thoroughly meme-ified the notion that New York was the “fifth character” in Sex and the City was seen as a perfectly legitimate observation. That trend has long since been retired. Now I must regretfully un-retire it to point out that not only is the disease that injects Susannah a character in Brain on Fire, it’s also the only one worth caring about.

The unnamed (until the end credits at least) illness that attacks Susannah is a fascinating, terrifyingly thorough monster. It attacks her on several fronts with surgical, almost cruel precision. Over the span of just a few weeks Susannah begins to experience: shortness of breath, exhaustion, numbness in extremities, visual and auditory hallucinations, loss of mental acuity, paranoia, seizures, and more.

It feels like this disease has both Gray’s Anatomy and the DSM-IV open on its lap for inspiration as it throws everything it can find at this unsuspected human being. Susannah’s life begins to fall apart as she’s unable to function at work, then at home, then even at hospitals. All the while every blood test, observation, and MRI she receives comes back normal.

The unseen disease is a powerful, compelling adversary. And it’s the only thing in the film that works. You may have noticed that when describing Susannah as a character in the second and third paragraphs, I mostly just listed the relationships she has with other human beings along with some general characteristics of journalists her age living in New York City. That’s because Susannah is a remarkably thin character

Susannah, despite being based on a real, undoubtedly complex and interesting person is an absolute cinematic nothing. She doesn’t feel like a fleshed out human being, or even a character. She’s just…nothing. The film even introduces a laughably unnecessary voiceover early in which Susannah informs the audience that she works at the New York Post and enjoys doing so as we watch her work at the New York Post and enjoy doing so.

Brain on Fire features an uncommonly strong cast for a film from little-known Irish writer-director Gerard Barrett. Given the events Susannah goes through, however, it’s clear to see what drew Moretz to the role. Susannah presents an opportunity to go incredibly broad. The illness effects her emotions, leading to outbursts of pure joy, fear, and despair. Moretz does a solid, technical job expressing these symptoms but the movie has already betrayed her with an underdeveloped character so she becomes just an actor doing overwrought acting exercises on camera.

The characters around Susannah are inessential at best. All of the adults fill the cinematic archetype of “Tough But Fair” with only Perry as her boss bringing a level of real gravitas. Slate is somehow improbably wasted. Every medical professional introduced is almost a parody of an ignorant, lazy pencil pusher. The doctor declares Susannah merely stressed. Then the therapist declares her merely stressed. And finally, in an almost perfect unintentional application of the comedic rule of three, a third doctor finally acknowledges she’s sick but figures it’s all in her head despite multiple seizures. Tom and Rhona react to him like he’s the doctor from Arrested Development.

When the disease is in full thrall, Brian on Fire becomes marginally more interesting only because the disease is interesting. Susannah is so underdeveloped that it almost doesn’t matter who the disease is effecting. The movie may as well be a PowerPoint presentation at a forensic medical conference. It’s a hell of a compelling PowerPoint though. Despite all of the movie’s flaws, it’s hard not to get invested in wanting to know the name and nature of this illness.

It also helps that in the third act, Dr. Najjar (played by Navid Negahban a.k.a. Amahl Farouk a.k.a. The Shadow King on on FX’s Legion) parachutes in as though he were precious rations from a much better movie sent to rescue a failing one. Negahban is legitimately wonderful in the role, portraying a deeply empathetic, ingenious doctor for a span of around 20 minutes. He almost succeeds in rescuing a movie that tried its hardest to fail.

Still, Brain on Fire doesn’t succeed. All the brilliance of its central medical mystery and the man who would eventually solve it are soundly defeated by the movie’s own lifelessness and laziness. Brain on Fire is like a virus itself, trying to infect an otherwise interest story with its own mediocre movie clichés.

2.5/5

7 Movies About Medical Mysteries That Will Leave You Speechless

Medical mysteries can fuel a lot of Hollywood film ideas.

These films can also scare us the most, because we start to think if they can happen to us, then find ourselves on WebMD for a diagnoses. We have all been there before.

We've rounded up the medical mysteries that shocked us the most and decided to share our seven favorites with you. Scroll below to check them out:
1. Brain on Fire

Starring: Chloe Grace Moretz, Thomas Mann, Richard Armitage

This Netflix movies is based on a story of a New York Post reporter, Susannah Cahalan, who begins to suffer from a neuroligical disease that cannot be explained. She begins to experience unexplained seizures, headaches, and voices in her head, yet doctors can't seem to figure out what's wrong with her.

Based on the book Brain on Fire by Savannah Cahalan, the film takes you on her long and painful journey to a diagnoses.

2. Everything, Everything

Starring: Amandla Stenberg, Nick Robinson, Anika Noni Rose

18-year-old Madeline Whittier (Amandla Stenberg) has grown up shielded from the world, required to stay indoors at all times. She is living with a rare autoimmune disease that keeps her from going outside. Her protective mother tries her best to keep her sheltered from anything that can harm her until she meets Olly (Nick Robinson), the boy next door.

3. Miracles From Heaven

Starring: Jennifer Garner, Kylie Rogers, Martin Henderson, Eugenio Derbez

Based on a true story of the Beam Family. Christy's (Jennifer Garner) daughter is suffering from a disease that doctors can't seem to figure out what it is. After several misdiagnoses, they discover she has rare incurable disease but Christy will stop at nothing to help her daughter.

After a freak accident, a miracle happens, and Anna (Kylie Rogers) is cured. This movie follows a real-life story of the Beam families journey.

4. Awake

Starring: Hayden Christensen, Jessica Alba, Terrence Howard

Young and wealthy Clay Beresford (Hayden Christensen) needs to undergo a heart transplant. During the surgery Clay finds himself awake, able to hear and see everything that's going on in the surgery.

While he is completely alert but paralyzed, Clay hears his surgeons plan to murder him.

5. Extraordinary Measures

Starring: Brendan Fraser, Keri Russell, Harrison Ford

Based on a true story, parents are trying to help their children fight a debilitating disease. Both of their kids have Pompe disease, an autosomal recessive metabolic disorder. John (Brendan Fraser) an advertising executive, goes to great measure to try and help save his kids' lives.

Robert Stonehill (Harrison Ford) might be their only help in finding a way to save their lives.

6. Before I Go to Sleep

Starring: Nicole Kidman, Colin Firth, Mark Strong

Every morning Christine (Nicole Kidman) wakes up and can't remember anything from the day before. Her brain isn't able to form memories because of a traumatic accident that happened. Her doctor has her record her daily routine to help her remember and little by little she starts to uncover the truth about her life.

7. Breathe

Starring: Andrew Garfield, Claire Foy, Hugh Bonneville

Inspired by a true story, Robin Cavendish (Andrew Garfield) has been diagnosed with polio at the age of 28 and is given only a few months to live. He and his wife, Diane Cavendish (Claire Foy), are determined not to let the disease stop them from living their lives and helping other patients with polio.