By Brandon Nolta

There are several surprises in store for viewers of AWAKE, the latest thriller to hit the multiplexes of America. Chief among those surprises is that it doesn’t suck, despite the semi-lame ad campaign that the film has been saddled with. It’s not a great film by any means, but it’s a decent one, and it has a way of filling out its 78-minute length quite nicely, without dragging its feet or rushing to its barely-plausible conclusion.

Clayton Beresford Jr. (Hayden Christensen) seems to lead a charmed life. Still a young man, he’s a respected venture capitalist and Wall Street whiz kid, richer than Croesus and affianced to the delectable Sam Lockwood (Jessica Alba), personal assistant to his powerful and just slightly overbearing mother (Lena Olin, still a regally lovely woman). Granted, he hasn’t worked up the nerve to tell his mom about the engagement, but he has other worries: he’s got a bad ticker, and is awaiting a transplant. You’d think being rich would help, but he’s got an uncommon blood type, and even money can’t influence biology. Anyway, he gets married in a whirl, and then gets a page from his friend Dr. Jack Harper (Terrence Howard), saying there’s a heart available. All good, right?

Well, things start to get a little hinky. Clay goes in for the surgery, and for reasons unknown, experiences a real but very rare condition called anesthesia awareness, meaning he can hear everything and feel what’s happening, but cannot move or communicate due to the paralytic agents administered with the anesthesia. Naturally, this sucks. Unfortunately, that’s not the end of it, as Clay soon realizes that his friend Jack and his surgical team plan to kill him for a piece of Clay’s incredible wealth. How, you might ask, will killing Clay get them some money, and why would they do this? The answers to those questions are among the film’s many plot twists (none of which are all that hard to spot) and developments as Clay, now wandering his memories and perceptions in an attempt to control the deep unpleasantness of experiencing heart transplant surgery live, reexamines his life and his options in an attempt to find a way out.


As mentioned, there are plot twists galore, which gives AWAKE the feel of medical noir at times; these are not surprising. What is surprising is that the cast turns in fairly credible performances for what is essentially a genre picture. It’s easy to forget after George Lucas’ prequels, but Christensen is a good actor, and he makes Clay a charming man whose business skills are not equaled by his life skills, and who has to figure them out on the fly. Olin manages to go from battleaxe to protective without changing her behavior, and Howard keeps a touch of sympathy about him even while being a bastard. Character stalwart Christopher McDonald gets to change up his usual persona, and even Ms. Alba manages a surprise or three. Nobody’s getting into RADA based on AWAKE, but there aren’t grounds for embarrassment here.

AWAKE represents one of the unsung achievements of cinema: the well-constructed genre film, modest in its aims and sure of its goals. Like the economy depending on the middle class, the living breathing body of film we call cinema depends on these workhorses of the film experience, the comfort food of those who love to sit in dark theaters and share a story. Christensen and crew have made AWAKE into a solid 78 minutes of entertainment that survived even the jackasses I saw the film with, and any film that does that is worth at least a matinee.