Based on courageous the true story of Augusto and Michaela Odone, two parents in a relentless search for a cure for their son Lorenzo's Adrenoleukodystrophy (ALD), 'Lorenzo's Oil' tells a tale so tragic yet moving, that it turns out to be An Extraordinary Film! Director George Miller & Actors Nick Nolte & Susan Sarandon bring this true story to life, with sensitivity & maturity. 'Lorenzo's Oil' is about how a family gives their all there is to cure their son from an incurable disease. The film is emotionally harrowing & also hard to watch at times. Your heart sinks for the child & your heartbreaks watching how his parents struggle. But, this is a courageous true-story about not giving up & fighting when life hits you hard. Sadly, Lorenzo, Augusto & Michaela Odone are not more among us. But, 'Lorenzo's Oil' is a salute to their spirits. Its a wonderful, challenging film, that doesn't deserve to be missed!Very Strongly Recommended!

One month ago, I became a father; and if I could define parenthood in one word, I would say 'concern'. How about love and responsibility? Believe me, when you're 'responsible' for the life of someone you 'love', it all leads up to anxiety, fear… indeed, concern.Ever since your child's born, the high-pitched cries coming from fevers, injections or stitches, make your heart bleed. And it goes on and on till the first cigarette or car accident. I'm not there yet, but in one month, I could relate more to my parents than I ever did in my whole life. And basically, "Lorenzo's Oil", directed by George Miller, chronicles the worst situation parents can ever face: an incurable disease.The parents are Augusto (Nick Nolte) and Michaela Odone (Susan Sarandon), the victim of this genetic cruelty is their boy Lorenzo, and the 'evil' has an ugly name: adrenoleukodystrophy (or ALD). It's caused by an overproduction of lipids that destroy myelin, the sheath that protects brains cells. In other words, it's a degenerative disease and Lorenzo's days are numbered. He starts as a healthy and lively child who grew up in Comoros Islands where his father was assigned, and shows progressive signs of mental troubles: tantrums, fallings, loss of hearing… But George Miller has a very straight-forward way to get us to the diagnosis after 10 or 15 minutes.The news fall like a death sentence and the doctor's tone prepares the parents for the worst. But their denial feels like the first of the five natural stages of grief that finally conclude with resignation, but how to resign when it's about something no one knows? Indeed, as laypeople, we're all inclined to respect whatever the doctor says, because he knows and we don't. So what to do when the doctors don't know the very abomination that strikes your child? The point is not to shaken the doctors' credibility but to confront the parents to two options: resign or fight.I said 'concern' is the defining word of parenthood, but by becoming purposeless in front of death; concern transcends its very meaning to make the miracle possible. In the film's pivotal moment, Augusto suggests to Michaela that they have to approach ALD as they did with Comoros: a new world to get immersed to, no matter how long it takes. Augusto and Michaela make their own researches in libraries and medical institutes, grabbing any piece of information that can help them to understand, for instance, why the diet ordered by the doctors didn't decrease the level of lipids, but made it worse.Meanwhile, Michaela reads stories to Lorenzo, talks to him, like a normal child, rejecting such advice as putting him in an institute or to 'think of herself'. But she can't enjoy life while his boy is trapped in that body and Augusto can't sleep without finding the answers. The film is an exhaustive and painful experience to watch, with scenes inter-cut through fade-out, as to suggest the inexorable passing of time. Time becomes an enemy, injecting all the stress in the parent's mind and alienating them for their family, and meeting the disapproval of their entourage, even the supports group and the medical corpse represented by Dr. Nikolais (Peter Ustinov).Nikolais is genuinely concerned by the case but warns them not to be carried away by hope because science requires discipline and time. But time is a luxury they can't afford and that's the core of the conflict although "Lorenzo's film" isn't a anti-scientific movie. George Miller, a medical doctor, didn't portray the doctors as a bunch of conservatives. In fact, the biggest clash occurs between Augusto and Muscatine (James Rebhorn) the support group organizer. Augusto loses his temper advocating his right to inform the other parents about a new treatment but even Muscatine makes a valid point about the misleading effect of hope, even when it's real.All the interactions feel real to a gut-wrenching level. The portrayal of ALD isn't sugarcoated either, it's an ugly, scary, disturbing, made of screams, epileptic outbursts and some close-ups are absolutely unnerving. Miller's directing is understandable; his angular shots emphasize the dizzying dive in the Odone's nightmare. Augusto screaming of despair on the stairs while contemplating the idea of death is one of the film's most haunting moments. But it makes the whole ending more satisfying since the researches finally pay-off, when two cooking oils reveal to be excellent remedy against the chain of fatty acids responsible of the disease.The conflict with doctors is not over but as a father who has dealt with doctors, I could relate to their obsession not to see over the limits of 'what is known'. At a crucial moment, the Odones blames the support group for acting as if the boys served the progress of science, while the opposite should prevail. The bias toward the Odones never seems gratuitous because it shows people as part of it, while the power should be theirs. "Lorenzo's Film" is difficult to watch but its lesson is an inspiration for all humanity, showing that the measure of true heroes is to go beyond their limitations. It sounds cliché, but sometimes, reality gets more extraordinary than fiction.Two well deserved nominations for Best Actress, Sarandon has never been so heart-breaking and Best Screenplay, whose accomplishment is to make medical explanation accessible while sticking to a documentary-like realism. But Nick Nolte and George Miller deserved nods for their intense work, Nolte convinced me as a gentle, strong-willed, Italian father who refuses to surrender to fatality.I close the review with these three smiling faces from the poster in my mind, sadly realizing realize that all these three people died in real life, but happy to see that their fight was not in vain, if only, because there's a treatment that saved many boys who were diagnosed early enough, and rightfully called "Lorenzo's Oil".

Lorenzo's Oil (I gotta finda a cure for mya boy!) (1992)In 1984, Lorenzo Odone was diagnosed with adrenoleukodystrophy (ALD,) in which enzymes that break down saturated fats are defective, and which severely affects myelin in the central nervous system. This resulted in the immediate commitment of his parents, Augusto and Michaela, to find a credible cure for the otherwise fatal disease.The story is the basic retelling of the events, with the occasionally added personal strife's of the parents, who's accuracy has been neither confirmed of denied by the real Augusto or Michaela. The plot has a quite generic outline, but boasts a more or less true story of a boy's disease that is not bombarded with other unnecessary sub-plots, which makes the effort quite admirable. However, there is the sub-plot were we see the physical and emotional decline of Michaela, but this is necessary to the story process because it provides us with good character development for Michaela and Augusto and gives us more insight on what they comprehend throughout the trial. By far the greatest thing about the film is the incredible knowledge of what it's subject matters are. The film takes with great precaution to explain to the viewer each and every procedure they try to the vocabulary that they learned, and exactly how they manage to devise the concoction of "Lorenzo's oil." However, I find aspects like the main antagonistic characters and some of the story to be crammed in the space of 110 minutes. The antagonists of the film seem to fall into the cliché of being overly arrogant and dismissive towards the underdog protagonists who try to help the cause, examples of this shows in the scenes of the APD parent meetings, where the board is unwilling to accept change unless doctoral consensus is advised. Plus there are some scenes at the end that were rushed because of time, we go from age 10 to 14 in only ten minutes, and rushes the progress of the recovery. Now the acting is also impressive, but sometimes can be unintentionally comical. To start off, Susan Surandon is impeccable as the mother, she really puts all of her effort into this role and she pulled off the vigilant motherly character with ease; you could honestly believe she that she genuinely cared for the actor playing Lorenzo. Then we find ourselves with Nick Nolte as the Italian-American father, Augusto. (sigh) Although his effort is noble, you should probably never hire a person from Omaha to play an Italian with a full-on accent. Now granted his performance is not terrible, but there were moments where I had to chuckle under my breath. In conclusion, Lorenzo's Oil is a flawed, but nevertheless enjoyable depiction of the journey to find the "impossible" cure. "Lorenzo's Oil" is a pretty good film, no masterpiece, but decent.See Full review at [email protected]

An inspiring true-life account of a husband and wife who, out of desperation, discover a treatment for their son's disease that otherwise had been dismissed by the medical community as untreatable.This is Lifetime movie stuff, and at any number of moments the film threatens to topple over into the overly maudlin and treacly. But it mostly avoids those pitfalls thanks largely to Nick Nolte and Susan Sarandon, who play the mom and dad and who make this film worth watching. Sarandon's role is a bit more stock, that of the suffering mother. But Nolte is ferocious as a man with an obsession, literally racing the clock to save his little boy.Will probably never be considered a great film, but is at least a pretty good one.Grade: B