Extraordinary Measures

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      Starring Brendan Fraser and Harrison Ford. Rated PG. Opens Friday, January 22, at the Cinemark Tinseltown

      There’s nothing special about Extraordinary Measures. From the generic title to a musical score seemingly written by Mrs. Butterworth, this fact-based save-the-children sob fest tries so hard to be heartfelt that it doesn’t actually leave the audience room to feel anything.


      Watch the trailer for Extraordinary Measures.

      Brendan Fraser is John Crowley, who gives up his corporate job to personally find, and fund, a cure for Pompe disease, a rare, degenerative genetic disorder afflicting two of his children. As adapted by Robert Nelson Jacobs (The Shipping News) from Geeta Anand’s nonfiction book and directed, rather anonymously, by Tom Vaughan, the film sheds some light into the tricky world where venture capitalism and medical research meet.

      Here, they meet in the form of Harrison Ford, who helped produce Measures and plays a cantankerous scientist reluctantly pulled into the biotech business with Crowley. Ford’s character is enjoyably overdone, which is fortunate, since the movie shows zero interest in the wife’s concerns or abilities, and Keri Russell doesn’t bring much to the family table. Although it’s nice to see Fraser get away from light action-adventure fare, it would take an actor of much subtler shadings to make this driven parent more compelling, but that’s not even asked of him.

      Along the way, there’s some decent supporting work from David Clennon, Patrick Bauchau, and Jared Harris (sporting an iffy American accent) as bottom line–driven investors. But, again, no one bothered to invest much integrity in the actual recipients of all this dedication, the sick children (Meredith Droeger and Diego Velazquez), who are invested with bland cuteness and little else. It would have been intriguing to explore the strain on this marriage or the left-out feelings of the one Crowley kid who isn’t sick (Sam M. Hall), but, sadly, no one was up to such monumental efforts.

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