‘Immortal’
OPRAH VIES FOR JUSTICE, GOES FOR GLORY IN HBO FILM
Oprah Winfrey soon may have something new to add to her favorite bookcase — a shiny Emmy for outstanding lead actress in a made-for-TV movie. The TV icon is the heart of HBO's searing “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks” (at 8 p.m.), delivering a raw, powerful performance as a grieving woman desperate to reclaim the mother she never knew.
The 90-minute film is sort of based on the 2010 “New York Times” bestseller of the same name by Rebecca Skloot. Here, the emphasis is on how the book was researched, how Skloot (played by Rose Byrne, “X-Men: Apocalypse”) befriended Lacks' only surviving daughter, Deborah (Winfrey), and convinced her she was trustworthy enough to tell the story of her mother.
Lacks (played in flashbacks by an affecting Renee Elise Goldsberry, “The Good Wife”) was a 31-year-old indigent Baltimore woman who died of cervical cancer in 1951.
Without her or her family's consent, Johns Hopkins Hospital researchers harvested her cancerous cells.
Lacks' cells — nicknamed HeLa — proved to reproduce copiously and were instrumental in medical research across the globe, leading to breakthroughs in everything from AIDS, Parkinson's disease and leukemia to the polio vaccine. The Lacks family was never compensated. When freelance science writer Rebecca contacts Deborah, she encounters a kind-hearted but erratic woman hesitant about speaking about her mother.
Deborah is prone to what appear to be intense manic-depressive episodes. When she is sad, she retreats to her bed. When she is excited, she can be terrifying.
At about the hour mark, “Immortal” explains Deborah's rages and the Lacks' resentments, and turns into something quite different than what viewers might be expecting. What emerges is a bracing reminder of how the loss of a family member can irrevocably alter the fates of those left behind.
There's also a stinging indictment of class, race and privilege here.
So impressed by the HeLa cell line, researchers badgered the family for years afterward, requesting blood samples in efforts to further isolate and understand Henrietta's unique genetic markers. The family thought they were being tested for the cancer. Researchers never even considered being straight with them.
Winfrey, who also serves as executive producer, is authentic and holds the screen, always. The script and the pacing do not always serve her well, but she delivers her very best, as fans — and Winfrey herself — have come to expect.
A chilling coda to the film is worth noting: “Patient consent is not required for research on human tissue obtained during medical treatment if the `donor's' identity is removed.”
Think about that the next time you schedule your annual physical.