Films involving Cancer

Cancer: Minor Films no photo.

Title	Desperate Measures (1998)
Alternative/Original Title
Disability	Cancer Leukemia
Country	USA
Length	100
Genre	Thriller
Rating	3
Director	Barbet Schroeder
Cast	Michael Keaton Andy Garcia Brian Cox Marcia Gay Hardin Erik King
Notes	A nine year old boy is dying from leukemia and needs a bone marrow transplant. His father, a San Franciscan policeman (Andy Garcia), finds the only suitable donor is a psychopathic criminal (Micheal Keaton). Interesting, methodical and suspenseful but when Garcia sacrifices fellow officers to save his son we're in a dilemma. I suppose that like the hundreds of films in which police cars pursuing a suspect put the lives of the public at risk we swallow our disbelief. Yet we do wonder how he is going to capture Keaton alive. And that is the crux of the film. The bone marrow is useless it is explained to us if Keaton dies. By Garcia's rash actions the police are pursuing not only Keaton but Garcia. Yet for Keaton there are so many no-win situations which like James Bond he manages to survive. And it gets really silly when he gains control of the computer which runs the building. SWAT teams which you know generally succeed through training and overwhelming firepower are picked off like bottles on a post. So this is yet another film in which it doesn't matter how many cops or civilians are killed to save one person. In the chase along the freeway Garcia, the policeman, not Keaton, the villain, crashes through the barrier into the opposite lanes setting off multiple accidents. To top it all there's a jokey ending with Keaton in a hospital bed, suggesting there might be a sequel. Let's hope not in the interest of keeping more people alive. This film has precious little to do with bone marrow transplants. Keaton is great as a psychopath, Garcia as a cop and the film just about works as a thriller.

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