Product Description

Academy Award(R)-winning star Sean Connery (Best Supporting Actor, 1987 -- THE UNTOUCHABLES), reunites with action director John McTiernan (THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER, DIE HARD) for another powerful collaboration in the heroic box office smash MEDICINE MAN! Screen favorite Connery plays Dr. Robert Campbell, a brilliant but unorthodox scientist racing against time in his bold research for a cure against cancer. Set deep in the forbidding Amazon rain forest, this action-packed hit follows Campbell hot on the trail of an amazing discovery -- but the eccentric recluse soon finds himself caught in the midst of an explosive adventure! Also starring Oscar(R)-nominee Lorraine Bracco (Best Supporting Actress, 1990 -- GOODFELLAS), MEDICINE MAN delivers unmatched entertainment with its spectacular mix of breathtaking scenery, captivating performances, and thrilling, nonstop excitement!

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #12364 in VHS
• Released on: 1994-04-14
• Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of tapes: 1
• Running time: 106 minutes

Amazon.com
Director John McTiernan (Die Hard) does an underwhelming job with this potentially interesting story of a research scientist (Sean Connery) who discovers a cure for cancer in the Brazilian rain forest, but then can't retrace his steps in creating the potion. Added pressure on his work is coming from developers burning down the forest, while an American bureaucrat (Lorraine Bracco), who holds the purse strings on the grant, has arrived to give him a bad time. The crucial chemistry between the stars just isn't there (Bracco can be hard to take at times), and, despite the added exotica of local witch doctors and seeing Connery swing through the trees, the elements just don't come together in this well-meaning but disappointing movie. --Tom Keogh

Customer Reviews

Maligned Minor Masterpiece
The critics really blew it on this one. (Leonard Maltin must have been having a really bad day.) Some of the reviews are absolutely bewildering - as if they saw some other movie.

"Medicine Man" is the rare action/adventure film with something more than car chases and shootouts on its mind, a passionate parable of the rampant destruction of the rainforest and the miracles of nature now threatened by "progress".

Sean Connery gives one of the best, most nuanced performances of his career, almost certainly the definitive "mature" Connery role, and Lorraine Bracco is a perfect foil as the sharp-tongued but endearing "Dr. Bronx" - their conflict thoroughly understandable and its resolution none too easy.

The breathtaking beauty of the rainforest and the haunting images of the native tribes driven from their homes (or decimated by the white man's diseases) are punctuated by thrilling aerial sequences high above in the jungle canopy - "the top shelf in the pharmacological superstore".

Forget the critics. This is an almost perfectly realized film, one that just gets better with each viewing, one that stays with you long after it's over.

For Connery fans, I also recommend one of his early (and nearly forgotten) films, "The Hill".

Every civilization needs a medicine man
Dr. Campbell (Sean Connery), a biochemist who has been doing extensive medical research for years in the lush rainforests of the Amazon, has found what just might be a MAJOR medical breakthrough. But that's not to say that he wouldn't enjoy just a little bit of help. Dr. Crane (Lorraine Bracco), a fellow biochemist comes to the aid of Dr. Campbell to help him as much as she can.

Will Dr. Campbell and Dr. Crane be able to find this miracle cure that could be just over the horizon? Will they be able to set aside their differences and actually be able to get along one of these days? These are the major questions that watching "Medicine Man" will answer for all the viewers who watch this great movie.

"Medicine Man" is one of those movies that doesn't need a bit of special effects to make it an unforgettable movie. It's a film that is real compelling and interesting to watch from start to finish without ever getting boring. With Sean Connery as the lead character, you know there will be great acting included.

If you're a fan of great movies, I definitely recommend to not miss out on your chance to watch and even own "Medicine Man."

What a great Adventure!!!
This movie is a favourite of the WISE Writers and Readers, beings that we are big Sean Connery fans!!... makes this movie work is the chemistry between the two leads. Lorraine Brocco absolutely is stunning!! She is a great comedic talent, a delight to watch as she matches wits with the ageless (only keeps getting better) Connery. The charm of their relationship, the incisive banter, the stunning location work, delivers one engaging movie.

They work in the question of the destruction of the rain forrest, and the real cost to man kind; the loss of moisture for rainfal, the loss of special one of a kind plants that could hold the cure for many modern diseases. I know many critics tried to put it down for offering no real solutions to this problem. Get real. This is a movie, it is meant to entertain. If it makes us think and wonder, then it has done it job. Solutions are up to the real world, not some fictional work. If someone could offer solutions to the problem in two hours - they would be a very rich man. I detest easy 'potshots' such as that.

The leads are charming, the natives in the film are wonderful, the scenery gorgeous ( Connery, Bracco AND the jungle!!), the writing is sheer perfection.

What more could you want??? From the moment Bracco arrives to find Connery in a bird costume and she introduces herself as Crane and he drunkenly replies, "No, Tucan.", you know you are in for a delightful time.

Also, notice the inside joke about the snake's name!!

DVD only enhances the experience of this utterly charming movie.