這部電影是對The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks這本書的具體演繹，我閱讀原著的時候頭腦中構建的圖像就和電影里所呈現(xiàn)的毫無二致。然而電影有兩個問題：首先它太戲劇化了，部分情節(jié)講故事的感覺太嚴重，讓人一看就覺得假，一看就覺得出戲。第二個問題是它對原著的改編不合理，有的地方過分忠實原著了，就像刪去原著里面所有討論的內(nèi)容只留下故事來。這兩個問題使得它有點像動態(tài)的書籍插圖。

然而ILHL的演繹還是非常成功的，雖然看起來導演對視覺語言的把握也是有點刻意、不自然。讓我很驚訝的是，我不需要任何線索，看到人物一出場就能知道他是誰，并且這些角色的演繹和我閱讀的時候所想象的完全一致。比如HeLa女士，這個演員簡直就是從照片里走出來的。還有Deborra，完全把底層黑人婦女演活了，很難想象這是一個非科班出身的脫口秀主持人的表演。只是Oprah的口音有點怪怪的南方風格，或許美國北方黑人也這么說話？

白院士說，ILHL的原著是“女性主義視角”，但電影更像是少數(shù)族裔文化視角。無論如何，本片作為一個非虛構作品的改編，還是相當成功的，雖遠達不到經(jīng)典的水平，也堪稱佳作了。

P.S. 白院士說原著既有女性主義視角，也有少數(shù)族裔視角。

I have to say that I was not moved at all. They seem to care about only money and kept going after financial compensations, not justice. Any family without a mother will have problems around it, no matter how the mother died or whether she turned into an immortal cell line or not. So save the pity. I wish the movie could educate more on the medical regulations back then and today. The movie did not detail on the drug tests they did on their mother or sister and should have spent more time on it instead of having Oprah showing off her ability of playing hysteric. These people have very little basic biology/medical knowledge and it can be extremely hard to teach them and make sure they stay objective about science and knowledge. They are after the money. They don't understand medicine or science. That's it.

If no consent was required from patient back then, they cannot sue Johns Hopkins.
If it's just about donating a little cancer tissue for research, I don't think, even today, the patient gets any specific financial compensation for that. It does not matter what your little biopsy turns out to be in 50 years or longer. I don't see a lot of other unhumane drug tests described in the movie. It's all about Oprah's emotions, not history or science.

Oprah's performance is too dramatic. If the movie is about racism, then make it about racism. And that did not seem to be the center of the movie either.

Johns Hopkins did mis-reported the name of the patient in the first place, and called it Helen Lane. (For quite a while during my research career, I thought it was Helen...) They should do something about it. And I feel sorry about it, too.

When HBO first released the movie, I thought they were going to make a very objective documentary instead of this sh*t. Isn't it true that HBO is good at showing good documentaries? What happened to them wasting money on this...

Just want to be fair from the perspective of a medical researcher. Please don't take anything personally.