Extraordinary Measures (2010) * *

Directed by:  Tom Vaughan

Starring:  Brendan Fraser, Harrison Ford, Keri Russell

Extraordinary Measures is the story of John Crowley (Fraser) whose two children are diagnosed with a fatal childhood disease and teams up with a gruff doctor (Ford) to find a cure.     It is based on a true story, although the facts are fudged considerably, and very similar to Lorenzo's Oil (1992) which was also based on a true story.     Lorenzo's Oil is much better.     Extraordinary Measures wants to be a feel-good film with every fiber of its being, but boy did it step wrong when it introduces Dr. Robert Stonehill (Ford). 

The real cure for Pompe disease, which afflicts Crowley's children and others, was discovered by an Asian doctor who I'm sure was not as tempestuous as Stonehill.     Since Stonehill is a fictional character, couldn't he have been written with fewer edges?     Sure, he deals mostly in chemistry and not with patients, but why make him an asshole that we have to suffer with until he undergoes his obligatory change of heart?     I guess he is supposed to be the eccentric with a heart of gold, but as played by Ford he is simply too obtuse for his own good.

Poor John Crowley goes through the wringer in his attempts to find a cure and save his children's lives.     He is an executive at a pharmaceutical company who creates a startup firm solely dedicated to patenting and selling the cure for Pompe.     It is risky, but time is of the essence.     Forming a new company with venture capitalists will cut through lots of red tape, even though the egotistical Stonehill nearly derails the project on numerous occasions.     What is this guy's problem?

Is he bitter because he invented a possible cure that was rejected by the medical establishment?     Does he want all of the credit?     Can he not work well with others?     The answer to all three is yes.    Of course, in each instance, he decides to lighten up and change for the common good, but dealing with Stonehill must be exhausting.      There is only so much gruffness we can tolerate.

There is enough intrinsic interest in a story about racing for a cure that will save people's lives.     Lorenzo's Oil did it with much more emotional weight and less like a TV movie.     In Lorenzo's Oil, a grief-stricken father and mother come up with their own cure for the disease that afflicts their son.     We sense the emotional and physical strain the two lay people undergo as they ask questions and research a disease that "six months ago didn't even have a name."   

Even the title Extraordinary Measures sounds more at home on the Hallmark Channel than it does as a feature film.     It is nice that the cure is found and lives are saved, including Crowley's kids, but there is no way for this movie to end in any other manner.      It is not designed to entertain the possibility of failure.     Lorenzo's Oil had a poignant scene in which the boy's parents played by Nick Nolte and Susan Sarandon grow to understand that the cure they find may not be able to save their own child, but will save other children.     Extraordinary Measures has no such thoughts.    We know everything will turn out ok, which robs it of its power.     I realize that I spent as much of this review discussing Lorenzo's Oil as I did the movie I set out to review.    That should tell you something.