Out of Darkness (1994)

This is far more than the average television movie, that's for sure. If only they could all be as good then maybe they wouldn't be looked down on so much. This film touches upon a lot of soft spots with me, it's so powerful and moving in many different ways. Just hearing the excellent theme music alone is enough to move me deeply and get me into the dramatic spirit of it, every time. The music is very beautiful and has a haunting melancholy feel to it that greatly captures the themes of adversity and fear very well. Diana Ross was just fantastic, if I were ever lucky enough to meet her I'd tell her how much I loved her in this. She must have had to go to a very dark place to portray so well the pain, madness and anguish of someone with a fragmented mind who had lived with such an unimaginable disease for so long. She did a highly effective job with her appearance, making herself appear all ramshackle and hard-edged, with a pained and grim expression that she wears for the first half of the film. Her deviousness in the scene where she poisons her sister with her medication is chilling. Her slow return to normality and a new life over the coarse of the film is inspiring to see. It's all handled in such a raw, honest and not overly-dramatic way that you can't help falling into the story and sympathising with everyone involved. ::: A brilliant talent that I've seen with another film from the director, the equally excellent "God Bless the Child", is his ability to deftly juggle many smaller characters and not have the plot seem cluttered, and make them all seem like fully realised human beings and not forgettable bit parts. And that's a huge part of why I love this and why I believe it works so terrifically, all the characters have a strong, rich sense of chemistry. There are plenty of fine examples of acting talent on display. Gloria Foster(Oracle off Matrix) was wonderful as the long-suffering and weary mother. For whatever reason, this film is not on her list of credits, nor is she credited in it. RIP. Chasiti Hampton put in a great little performance as the mature-beyond-her-years daughter who fears that she will inherit her mother's condition. Lindsey Crouse, who a lot will probably recognise as the villainous Professor Walsh from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" puts in a strong turn as the straight-laced but compassionate shrink who patiently works Paulie back to mental health. I just love her in two scenes where she forces Paulie to face reality and drags her out of bed and into a cold shower, and another where she holds onto her until she calms down on a frightening trip on a busy subway train. Maura Tierney is really sweet and poignant in an early role as Paulie's friend and fellow schizophrenic sufferer Meg, who's fragile mental state gives way to suicidal despair in one harrowing scene. ::: There are numerous emotionally moving scenes and moments that can make me all misty about the eyes, chief among them is absolutely the heart-rending final scene, which is superbly done and astoundingly moving. The way she sees the damaged woman that could so easily have been her had she not have gotten the help she needed from so many devoted people. That scene does bring tears every time I see it because it really sums up and concludes everything so perfectly. It's quite a harsh film, but also hopeful if one is still happening to be finding the way out of their own darkness... And I appreciate it very much when hope in a film is not some great, golden sunrise moment, but something small and quaint. more realistic-and to me far more precious and meaningful for it. She's finally free, and in a good place where she's hopefully overcome her nightmare for good, but she looks back at that Shadow of a human being with a heavy heart, because she's been there too.

I stumbled across this on the Lifetime Movie Network, and was blown away to finally see an unglamorous, starkly accurate portrayal of someone with schizophrenia. Kudos to Diana Ross, that can't possibly be an easy performance!!! Being bi-polar, I've been in and out of mental wards as a patient, seeing other patients with schizophrenia. This is the first time I've ever seen a movie or television show that captures the frightening reality without making it seem like a mere eccentricity. Now, if someone would just make a decent movie about being bi-polar, so I could point to it to help people understand what I go through.

this film is really about longterm illness, or "loss of life" and the devastation it causes. the character was a brilliant, vivacious young woman. when she was born the doctor said this child has been "touched by god" because she was so beautiful. noone was sharper, nobody was quicker than Paulie. she was going to be a doctor, in her 3rd year of medical school. and then she got schitzophrenia. 18 years later she wakes up. shes 43, not 25 any more. shes lost 18 YEARS of her life. her life doesnt exist anymore. - her sister is a middle aged woman, who resents her for the way shes behaved, her mother is resigned to the fact her daughter is mentally ill. and she has a daughter she doesnt know, whom shes never known. the story is heartbreaking. Diana Ross is convincing, and the script is accurate. it may not be the best film about schitzophrenia, but as a view of the consequences, and the effects, it is well worth watching.

TV movie "Out of Darkness" allows us to experience the turns on Pauline Cooper's life, an afro-american Medicine student who at the height of her student life is caught by paranoid-schyzophrenia, at the age of 23. Action starts on a usual day of Pauline's life and takes the viewer to a critical phase on the character life. The story also shows us the daily struggle of living with someone who is not the owner of its own will, due to mental illness, and how it can affect an entire family. The movie most inspirational scenes are those of the attempts of Pauline to restart her normal life, after endless hospital treatments and experiences with new drugs to treat the disease. The most important message of the film is a kind of a tribute and a positive inspiration to all those who fight mental problems. Diana Ross put her movie career back on the track after several years without movie appearences (since "The Wiz" in 1978). Miss Ross wisely found this project and produced it trough her ANAID Film Productions as the perfect veycule for a movie comeback. One of the most interesting aspects of the movie is that Ross is not playing a singer (as usual), and does not contributes with songs to the soundtrack, making it a plain acting-ability show, reminding us that being one of the greatest show women alive, requires more than playing singers in trouble. "Out of Darkness" is also an open door to other drama projects by Diana Ross, leaving the viewer with high expectation for more projects starring Diana Ross on the so-called serious matters of life. It is also the evidence that Diana Ross is not the distant diva at all.