When the film started, I wasn't sure if I'd be interested. This movie is portrayed from a very personal, one on one standpoint of a cancer patient. Memories, insights, humor and fears - Emma Thompson is phenomenal in this role! Never before has a movie pulled so much emotion from me from so many levels. Bravo!

Based on the Pulitzer Prize winning play "Wit" (aka "W,t"), it was adapted and rewritten for HBO film by Mike Nichols and Emma Thompson.Prof. Vivian Bearing (Thompson) specializes in John Donne's 17th century metaphysical poetry. (Donne wrote the famous "No man is an island unto himself, Everyman is a part of the continent, a piece of the main..." which I've long loved and understand; but Donne's "Holy Sonnets" are unfamiliar and considerably beyond me;--no matter, this film remains great!.) She's a renowned scholar and popular teacher but yet quite demanding (& without compassion for her students). After Prof. Bearing is diagnosed with terminal ovarian cancer, she agrees to participate in a research trial of a medicinal course. During the movie, she frequently breaks the "fourth wall," often speaking directly to the camera (we, the audience) as she wrestles with the meaning of her life (& death) and her growing awareness of her mortality and the importance of compassion in life. A compelling movie to watch, it's sad (tissues mandatory) but also very uplifting at the end. The background music is excellent and appropriate in both mood and title (it includes Arvo Part's "Spiegle im Spiegle" ("Mirror in Mirror") & Charles Ives "Unanswered Question.") IMDb says this movie is now shown in many medical schools teaching future MDs the importance of compassion. Roger Ebert said Thompson's performance was her best on film. My rating of this Emma Thompson performance: >15+/10.

I happened on Wit in a discount video bin at Barnes and Noble, and picked it up largely because it was cheaper to buy than rent and I am a fan of Emma Thompson's.I was not at all prepared to be drawn into the stark, claustrophobic realm of end-stage cancer, the sea of regret and self-analysis that can only happen when the end is near and one is very much alone. The story of how a disease broke even the stoic, cold, and very much alone professor of holy sonnets is not exactly uplifting, but it is a stunning performance, a riveting and realistic performance. Emma Thomson is as always brilliant, and this movie is very centralized, almost entirely consisting of Emma Thompson's internal dialogue, but she's helped along ably by Audra McDonald, the tony-award winning singer who stowed her amazing singing voice to play a nurse who represents the humanity inherent in medical dilemmas, even as the doctors (played by the famous Christopher Lloyd and Jonathan Woodward, who I've never seen before) relegate a human being purely to the academic world; a world which the abandoned person ironically used to live in exclusively.It is draining, disturbing, exhausting, and not a film to be watched everyday, but it is well-done and it was a shame it didn't get any more exposure and theatrical release. I'm guessing people didn't think the one-person dialogue would play well on the big screen. But if you are in the mood for a great performance, check out this Emma Thompson work. Just remember to breathe all the way through.

You will want to smash your TV set after you watch this unbearably sad film.I watched it when my sister was dying of Ovarian Cancer...and maybe that's why it seemed so brutal. I thought I might find some inner strength from this movie..I didn't. Ovarian Cancer seems to be of little interest to anyone..and breast cancer has leaped to center stage.Every scene tore at my heart..as I waited for...what? We knew she would die...we just didn't know how horrible the end of her life would be.Maybe someday I can watch it again, and find something better to say.10 hankie movie