1980 Directed by Jud Taylor
A tragic motorcycle accident leaves one brother paralyzed while the other brother is left guilt-ridden. Seeing his brother struggle with his new life of limited mobility and function, the young man finds his own life weighed down by his thoughts and feelings about the accident. Motivated by his emotions and the suffering of his brother, the young man performs an "act of love" which creates more chaos for him.
USA
USA
While I expected very little from this one being part of a Mill Creek 50-pack that has had more ripe aged garbage than watchable films, I was actually very surprised to find myself glued to the TV for this one. I'm not even one to care much for Courtroom Dramas (as illustrated by this one's ranking on my 'Trials' linked list below), but I was actually hooked from act two onward. Mickey Rourke does fine job in his short role, but the real stars here were Ron Howard and Robert Foxworth as Howard's unflappable lawyer. I'm not at all ashamed to like this obscure 1980 TV movie, I think it deserves more recognition as part of Rourke's & Howard's filmographies.
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"Act of Love" is a fairly effective little drama hampered by the poor visual quality. I mean it's a TV movie from 1980 so I don't expect it to look pristine but the Mill Creek copy I watched had everyone's skin appearing bright red and it's just kind of hard to look at.
The plot concerns Mickey Rourke who gets paralyzed in a motorcycle accident. Realizing his dismal future prospects he asks his brother Ron Howard to take his life. Howard agrees and ends up facing a court case as a result. Touching on some of the same heart wrenching subject matter that would be taken up by the much later "Million Dollar Baby" I think the script does a good job dealing with a difficult topic.
The actual court case was a little short on drama for my taste, but overall this is a quality TV Movie. Rourke makes a big impression with a small role.
The premise to this film seemed really interesting, a film about a guy who kills his quadriplegic brother all because he doesn't want him to suffer. And while the premise sounds interesting, the film is not bad. The acting is pretty good, the film stars a young Ron Howard and a young Mickey Rourke tho so. The film also does a good job at balancing both sides of the argument. We need more of that in courtroom dramas. Everything else is decent for a TV movie. The film just feels like it left stuff out, and i understand it was a TV movie and didnt have a big run time but im sure they could have made it work. I…
MOTW garbage that finds Richie Cunningham on trial for murder after assisting in the suicide of his brother, played by Mickey Rourke, who is paralyzed after an accident and doesn't want to live like that. Rourke is the lucky one, who only has to endure twenty minutes of this, but director Jud Taylor saps all the emotion from his scenes, as he lies on the hospital bed barking his desires at his wife, and then imploring Richie to do what is necessary, which apparently translates to sawing off a shotgun and shooting him at close range, which merely causes his head to turn slightly to the other side. Half way through the perspective changes to Richie's lawyer, played by eighties…
This is a gut wrenching story of a two brother that were extremely close, Leon & Joseph Cybulkowski. Joseph was riding a motorcycle, had an accident that left him a quadriplegic. Joseph did not want to live that way - he felt he was only a "head", that's all he was able to use - so he made his brother Leon promise to kill him if the operation still left him a quadriplegic. Leon did shoot his brother - kill him as promised. A lawyer took Leon's case because the courts want him charged with 1st degree murder, the lawyer does not want to use the euthanasia (mercy killing) defense, he wants to use the "not right in the head" defense.…
