Product Description: Richard Pimentel (Ron Livingston) begins his life as a fighter and his life's work becomes a process of fighting for the rights of others.Rising up from a childhood in a dysfunctional family armed with a talent for public speaking and a winning personality the young man makes his way to a Northwestern college confident that he will ace his try-out for his idol Dr. Ben Padrow (Hector Elizondo) the coach of the winningest team in the history of the College Bowl.But Dr. Padrow shatters his dream when he rejects him. Richard's immediate reaction is to enlist in the army for a tour of duty in Vietnam. During combat the young recruit loses his hearing to a bomb blast and has to deal with this newfound disability on his return to civilian life in Oregon.Richard discovers that his disability and the struggle to transcend it is a defining moment in his fight for what he believes in. When he tries to help his friends vets like himself and others with disabilities to get work in an environment that treats them with pity at best and disdain as a matter of course he realizes that he can make a difference. The friends who make up his close-knit clique are: Art Honneyman (Michael Sheen) a student wheel chair user with cerebral palsy who uses his rapier wit to deflect the prejudice that greets his disturbing appearance; Mike Stoltz (Yul Vazquez) a fellow veteran with a lot of rage and nowhere to put it; and then there is Christine (Melissa George) the passionate libertine who strokes Richard's ego and initiates him into the world of free love.Together the friends experience the currents of those turbulent times and the wild joyful energy of winning through confrontation and humor. Without his hearing Richard is all the more prepared to listen to the message deep within himself and to carry that message to the thousands of people whose lives are improved by the movement he helps to organize.System Requirements:Running Time: 93 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DR
Amazon.com: A movie about a man who fought for the civil rights of the disabled may sound unbearable and self-important, but Music Within will surprise you with its rough, irreverent, and very entertaining wit. Even the title is caustic joke: Richard Pimentel (Ron Livingston, Office Space) comes back from the Vietnam War with a severe ringing in his ears that leaves him virtually deaf. Pimentel finds a new path in life when he starts a career finding jobs for his fellow vets--and forms a deep friendship with Art Honeyman (Michael Sheen, The Queen), a brilliant man whose body is twisted by cerebral palsy. Pimentel never loses his sardonic sense of humor, but he does find a genuine purpose in life when the U.S. government hires him to create a program to help employers hire the disabled--but his cause leads him away from his increasingly frustrated girlfriend (Melissa George, 30 Days of Night). Music Within proves to be a to be a garrulous, enjoyable warts-and-all biography, one that admires Pimentel's accomplishments but never loses sight of his human failings. No one gets turned into the representative of a suffering group; every character is well-drawn individual. Sharp supporting turns by Hector Elizondo (Pretty Woman), Yul Vazquez (American Gangster), and especially Rebecca De Mornay (Risky Business), as Pimentel's schizophrenic mother, give Music Within added punch. --Bret Fetzer
Customer Reviews
Average Rating:
Rating: - Brilliant!!!
One of the BEST movies I've ever seen!!! Absolutely brilliant! Inspiring, beautiful, touching, amazing!!! Highly recommend to anyone and everyone! What movies should be all about... Deserves every award and acclaim. Anyone who says they don't like this movie must not appreciate the triumph of the human spirit.
Rating: - Not perfect but a good story
The story is really inspirational. The acting while not great was pretty good in my opinion. Ron Livingston did a good job as the lead. The film was rough at times with cuts and cinematography but the story and Livingston's performance combined with the witty humor make this a film worth watching.
Rating: - Missed Opportunity
The biopic aspect of the story is interesting, but everything else--from the acting to the use of music to cue nearly every plot event--is downright ridiculous. Huge waste of time. I couldn't make myself finish it. I'd rather find a well-written account of the events and have a good read instead.
Rating: - A generally solid biopic, although it loses its footing at times
Music Within is a biopic revolving around Richard Pimentel, a wounded Vietnam vet whose efforts at finding jobs for fellow wounded vets along with his friendship with Art Honeyman, a writer with severe cerebral palsy, led to Richard's widespread workplace disability training and the eventual creation and adoption of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990.
However, despite solid performances by Ron Livingston as Richard, Melissa George as his love interest Christine, and Michael ... Read More
Rating: - A Good `Small Film' that should have the editor killed
First off, Ron Livingston (as Richard Pimentel) is excellent in a dramatic role having been in so many great comedies (Office Space). Michael Sheen is absolutely brilliant as a wheelchair confined sufferer of Cerebral Palsy. In my mind, they blew it not having more screen time for Sheen.
Short to be short: The first 10 minutes of this self narrated film were excellent. Richard's mother(Rebeca deMorney) has had miscarriage after miscarriage (7 in fact) until Richard is miraculously born. ... Read More