Top 10 Medical-Themed Movies for Med Students on Winter Break

While enjoying some well-deserved free time on winter break, U.S. and Caribbean medical students have a number of Hollywood blockbusters from which to choose. Why not save money and instead rent a DVD or download on Netflix some films that will allow you time to relax after a semester of nonstop studying while also offering insight into medicine, health care and what being a doctor is really like?

The UMHS Endeavour looks at great films from the past and present that every medical student should see. We list them in no particular order and this is hardly a comprehensive list. While some won Oscars and critical acclaim, others aren’t perfect but are noteworthy for their cult status among med students.

1. Wit: Based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning 1998 Off Broadway drama of the same name by Margaret Edson, this 2001 adaptation by Mike Nichols for HBO, starring Emma Thompson, is an illuminating look at what cancer does to both the patient and doctor. Thompson plays a rather snooty college English professor of metaphysical poetry who is suddenly diagnosed with Stage 4 ovarian cancer. She’s not exactly the most likable or sympathetic character—much like some real-life patients—but there’s something about her journey through chemotherapy, flashbacks of her life, and being treated by a doctor who was once one of her students that makes us overlook her abrasive personality. The film is a classic because it shows the horror of terminal illness and the complexities of the doctor/patient relationship with truth instead of sentimentality.

2. Philadelphia & And the Band Played On: These two dramas tie for a spot on the list. Philadelphia is a 1993 classic that was the first mainstream Hollywood film to explore what was then still rather taboo subject matter: AIDS. Tom Hanks won an Oscar for his portrayal of Andrew Beckett, a gay Philadelphia lawyer dying of HIV. As he starts getting sick, developing lesions on his skin, Hanks is soon fired from his law firm. “He brought AIDS into our offices--into our men's room!" screams one of the partners. Hanks wants to sue the firm for discrimination, but no Philadelphia lawyer wants to take the case. Denzel Washington plays the African-American lawyer who decides to defend Hanks, and Washington’s character begins to see parallels between the struggles of blacks and people with HIV. Although courtroom scenes dominate a large portion of the film, the story ultimately focuses on Hanks’ character losing his battle to HIV and deals with the human side of terminal illness, death and dignity. It is a great chronicle of the prejudice, ignorance and fear that ran rampant during the AIDS pandemic.

Although not as powerful as the book on which it is based, the 1993 HBO film adaptation of the late Randy Shilts’ bestseller And the Band Played On: Politics, People & the AIDS Epidemic offers a more comprehensive look at the medical and political ramifications of AIDS in America. Opening in 1976 in Zaire, Africa, American epidemiologist Don Francis (Matthew Modine) learns that locals are dying from a strange illness identified as Ebola hemorrhagic fever. Flash forward to 1981, when Francis is working for the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and a similarly strange illness starts claiming the lives of gay men in New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco. Soon, AIDS spreads to other groups of people. Modine’s character maintains that AIDS is a sexually transmitted virus, while CDC officials argue it’s a blood disease, and scientists bicker over who should take credit for discovering HIV, the virus causing AIDS. Meantime, the death toll climbs at shocking rates. With its all-star cast, from Lily Tomlin to Richard Gere, Alan Alda, Anjelica Huston and more, this is must-see viewing for anyone interested in one of the worst public health crises in American history.

3. The Doctor: This 1991 film stars William Hurt as a California heart surgeon known for being cold and emotionless, especially to his own family. He treats his patients as numbers, not people. Suddenly, Hurt gets ill and is diagnosed with throat cancer. He’s subjected to the bureaucracy of the medical system and the sometimes callous attitude of colleagues. The movie is based on the real-life memoirs of surgeon Ed Rosenbaum, A Taste of My Own Medicine.

4. Awakenings: Based on British neurologist Oliver Sacks’ 1973 memoir, this Oscar-nominated 1990 drama, directed by Penny Marhsall, stars Robin Williams (here, fictionalized as American Malcom Sayer). In 1969, he discovers the benefits of the drug L-Dopa and administers it to catatonic patients, all victims of an encephalitis epidemic decades earlier. Robert De Niro plays Leonard Lowe, who hasn’t communicated since he was a child and is awakened after a lifetime of catatonia. The film is a favorite of med students because of depiction of the excitement of clinical research.

5. Something the Lord Made: This 2004 HBO movie chronicles the men who pioneered modern-day heart surgery. The tale unfolds in Nashville and Baltimore circa 1930, depicting the work of African-American carpenter Vivien Thomas (Mos Def) and his volatile partnership with white doctor Alfred Blalock (Alan Rickman), the chief surgeon at John Hopkins University. Overcoming the racism of the time, when hospitals in the American South were still segregated, the two men band together to save babies suffering from congenital heart defects and create new advances in cardiology.

6. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest: Winner of five Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Actor for star Jack Nicholson (who plays character McMurphy), the 1975 screen adaptation of Ken Kesey’s bestselling novel is on virtually everyone’s list of the best films ever made, and med students will appreciate its insights into mental illness and what is truly “normal” and “abnormal” in human behavior. Nicholson plays a convict who thinks life in a mental institution is easier than prison, so he fakes insanity to be moved to an asylum. He gets his wish, but his preconceived notions about the mentally ill are shattered as he encounters patients and the ultra-mean Nurse Ratched (Louise Fletcher, who also won an Oscar for the role). Filmed in a real mental hospital in Oregon, many doctors believe One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest changed psychiatry in America and led to the development of better anti-psychotic medication that has helped some patients stay out of institutions.

7. M*A*S*H & Article 99: These two hospital-themed movies tie for a place on the list. The 1970 Robert Altman film MASH (later adapted into a popular, long-running TV sitcom) won an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay and was, for many of us, our first look at daily life in a hospital, although the one depicted here is a Mobile Army Surgical Hospital during the Korean War. The story centers on the comic antics of wisecracking surgeons Duke (Donald Sutherland) and “Hawkeye” Pierce (Elliot Gould). Although they raise lots of hell, they are excellent combat surgeons, and the film’s funniest scenes involve their clashes with the rigid, by-the-book head nurse, Major Margaret “Hotlips” Houlihan (Sally Kellerman), and their tent mate, Major Frank Burns (Robert Duvall), a pious man, overall jerk, and a bad doctor. The film, many say, is much funnier than any episode of the TV series.

Although hardly a favorite among critics, 1992’s Article 99 is loved by many in the medical community because it shows the lengths doctors sometimes go to just to help patients heal. Set in a run-down Veterans Administration hospital, Dr. Peter Morgan (Kiefer Sutherland) starts an internship and expects he’ll coast through on his way to private practice. He soon learns that life in a VA hospital is mostly about the alarming ratio of patients that outnumber beds. He meets Dr. Richard Sturgess (Ray Liotta), and together they defy the belt-tightening by hospital management and try to bend rules to save lives.

8. Lorenzo’s Oil: Based on a true story about parents seeking a cure for their son’s Adrenoleukodystrophy (ADL), a rare nerve disorder that affects the adrenal glands, nervous system and testes in boys, this 1992 film stars Susan Sarandon (who received an Oscar nomination for her role) and Nick Nolte as Michaela and Augusto Odone. When their 6-year-old son, Lorenzo, is diagnosed with ADL, the Odones are told there is no cure and the boy will become disabled and eventually die. Despite having no medical background, the Odones spend time in medical libraries and talk to researchers and doctors. They help create an ADL treatment from olive and rapeseed oil and name it “Lorenzo’s Oil.” What sets this effort apart from so many insipid disease-of-the-week TV movies is George Miller’s skillful direction, keeping the story from ever becoming mawkish or contrived. Sadly, the real-life Lorenzo Odone died in 2008 at age 30 from pneumonia, but his story lives on in this inspiring medical classic.

9. Patch Adams: This 1998 film is one people either love or hate (“quackery,” said the late critic Roger Ebert), but it broke box-office records worldwide and is loved by many med students, regardless of what you ultimately think of it. Robin Williams stars as Dr. Hunter “Patch” Adams, a physician who tries to heal patients through laughter, much to the horror of his medical colleagues. See the movie if only for the insider medical humor.

10. The Caretakers: The last film on our list goes all the way back to 1963. Set in the overcrowded mental ward of a hospital, Polly Bergen stars as Lorna Melford, a neurotic woman who freaks out in a movie theater and is soon committed. She endures the brutal ECT (electroconvulsive therapy) that was standard procedure in the days before medication was available to help people suffering from major depressive disorder, schizophrenia, mania and catatonia lead normal lives and stay out of hospitals. Progressive Dr. MacLeod (Robert Stack) spends much of the film clashing with the conservative hospital administration about the “borderline” mental patients that stand a chance of being cured, and Joan Crawford plays a particularly menacing head nurse. Half a century ago, strait jackets, ECT and the grisly practice of lobotomy were common in the medical world. See this film for one reason only: To understand just how far medicine has come in the treatment of mental illness in the past 50 years.

Honorable Mention

My Left Foot: The Story of Christy Brown, Sicko, The Men, John Q, Malice, The Painted Veil, Race for the Double Helix, Angels in America, Suddenly Last Summer, Frances.

What’s Your Favorite Medical-Themed Movie?

We know there are many movies we’ve left out. Please feel free to let us know what your favorite medical-themed movie is.

(Top photo) MEDICAL-THEMED MOVIES FOR WINTER BREAK: Relax with some classics over the holidays. Photo: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

About UMHS:

Built in the tradition of the best US universities, the University of Medicine and Health Sciencesfocuses on individual student attention, maintaining small class sizes and recruiting high-quality faculty. We call this unique approach, “personalized medical education,” and it’s what has led to our unprecedented 96% student retention rate, and outstanding residency placements across the US and Canada. UMHS is challenging everything you thought you knew about Caribbean medical schools.