Coma
A young doctor at a hospital, Susan Wheeler, starts noticing a pattern of strange occurrences with patients.
Coma is a 1978 American mystery thriller film based on the 1977 novel of the same name by Robin Cook. The film rights were acquired by director Michael Crichton, and the movie was produced by Martin Erlichmann for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. The cast includes Geneviève Bujold, Michael Douglas, Elizabeth Ashley, Richard Widmark, and Rip Torn.
Dr. Susan Wheeler is a surgical resident at Boston Memorial Hospital. Susan is devastated when a patient, Nancy Greenly, who happens to be her best friend, is pronounced brain-dead and comatose there after a routine suction D & C (Dilation and Curettage) abortion and its concomitant general anesthetic. Her suspicions are aroused when another young and otherwise healthy patient, Sean Murphy, also falls comatose during knee surgery for a recent sports injury.
Susan finds that over the previous year an unusual number of other fit, young people have suffered the same fate. She discovers three similarities among the cases: they all took place in the same operating room, all patients were tissue-typed and all the comatose bodies were moved to a remote facility called the Jefferson Institute.
Michael Douglas called the film “the first time I’ve been offered a project with a good story laid out well, a good cast, and a good director.”
Coma was a box-office success, earning $50 million US (about $185 million in 2016 U.S. dollars). It was well received by critics and audiences. The film holds an 81% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
Michael Crichton was a friend of Robin Cook. They met when Crichton was doing post-doctoral work in biology at La Jolla’sSalk Institute and Cook was a Navy physician stationed at San Diego. Crichton described the film as like a “Western… if the doctors are the bad guys they are also the good guys.”
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