A very feeble attempt at affirmatie action

A brilliant film that helped define a genre

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

.Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

Spoiler don't read after this point if you don't want to know. The main theme in the movie is about spirituality and it gives you a look in to what the writer thinks happens when we pass away. In this movie someone is about to die but as his soul leaves his body and visits every loved person to say it's good byes, he figures out that if he leaves at this moment the two persons he cares the most for, will hate each other and there for resent each other and end their friendship forever; instead of supporting each other after he is gone. So he decides to go back to his body and fight for his life. As he gets better and starts his difficult new life; he hates it ,as he forgot the reason why he went back. But thanks to the help of a friend that believes in spirituality, he is able to remember why he came back. Once he feels like the two people that he came back for, care and support each other... Then he is ready to die.

***SPOILERS*** I at first thought that the movie "Above & Beyond" was a re-make of the Robert Taylor 1952 film about the bombing of Hiroshima but soon realized that it was about a whole different subject! The film has to do with this faith healer furniture store owner Joe Farelli, Robert Costanzo, who discovered , probably from the 1986 "New Twilght Zone" episode he was in, that faith is stronger then the scalpel or even a stay at the local hospital emergency ward.We get to see Joe in action as he cures policeman and part-time hokey player Peter Clerkin, Adam Baldwin,from a serious injury he got on the hockey court. This is very impressive indeed in Peter recovering a full two week before his doctors said he would. It's later when Peter and his partner Michael Amorosa, Costas Mandylor, try to stop a distraught man from murdering his cheating wife and her lover, whom he caught in the act, that he accidentally shoots Michael when the bullet that it was intended for, the outraged husband, passed through his body killing him and hitting Michael in the spine! Things start to get very complicated with Michael's wife Jill, Alexandera Paul, rushing to he hospital and not only finding out that he husband Michael will be crippled for life but that his partner Peter, who just happened to be her former lover, put him in that condition!We get to see Joe show up at the hospital and do his thing on the barley conscious and heavily medicated Michael that at first seemed to help him recover. But as time went by Michael's recovery and Joe, who soon disappeared from the movie altogether, went by the boards with him now becoming an angry and bitter young man in him not being able to be a man or husband to his loving and caring wife Jill.From that point on the movie goes nowhere fast in it just about running out of gas or story and just coast or limp along to it's final and very unsatisfying, to everyone watching, conclusion. Peter is made to be the heel in the film by him getting it on with his best friends and police partner's wife Jill throughout the remainder of the film. That while Michael was laid up in bed not being even able to go to the bathroom without someone assisting him. ***SPOILERS*** It's just when your about to switch the movie off that we get to see Michael recover from his injury and get on his feet again but were not quite sure if it's real or a drug or medicated induced hallucination on Michael's part. Michael for his part accepted his fate in being a paraplegic and not being able to be a husband to his wife Jill anymore. He even goes so far as encouraging Jill to drop him and marry Peter who's been having an affair with Jill behind Michael's back anyway. The movies final ending is a bit too much to take in that it doesn't really tell you what happened between Michael Jill & Peter in it by it seeming to have two different alternative endings. But by then your so bored by it all that you couldn't really care which way it ended anyway!

This is one of the most disappointing movies I have ever seen, mainly because of the ending. Even though there were a lot of weak spots in the movie, I still had some hopes that it could be saved with a good ending. Even though the best friend's comments early in the movie made it clear what his feelings were, the plot allowed him to realize them through his own misdeeds. The husband's choice at the end made absolutely no sense. There were so many options that were available to him, and his choice was the least palatable. The final shot of the movie was the last straw, and had me shouting obscenities that I had wasted my time watching this movie. I watched it this morning on a cable network and I feel very disappointed that I allowed this movie to ruin my whole day.

This is a very poorly written movie. A police officer accidentally shoots his partner/best friend and paralyzes him. The movie fades from there to nothing. It is obvious that whoever wrote the story worships the physical aspects of life, and nothing more. The paralyzed cop refuses to touch his young wife after the accident. Why? Because he's a 'poor little me'. He basically pushes his wife onto the partner who shot him, and she goes, willingly. Well, folks, if that is all you think life is... sex and physicality... you're emotionally somewhere between 15 and 19 years old. Because that's NOT all there is! If the paralyzed cop really loved his wife he would honor his covenant with her. He still had full use of his arms, and they do make 'devices' for paraplegics that makes sex possible.But there is so much more to life than sex and youthful physical exuberance. This movie was a MAJOR letdown and I am sorry I watched (okay, I was working on my book at the time, so thankfully I only 'half'watched it.) Don't waste your time with this movie. It doesn't begin to explore what it could have explored. The 'for better or for worse' aspects of the marriage covenant. True friendship. The guy who shot his partner could have done penance by building the house the paralyzed guy wanted to build for his wife. The wife could have understood her husband's pain and fear and with unconditional love, overcome both. The paralyzed husband could have understood that 'no man is an island' and reached out to his wife and his best friend for help. People need to be needed more than they need to be loved. Giving and receiving. Receiving and giving. The writer COULD have explored the complexities of life and love, man and woman, but alas!, he couldn't think past his biceps and gonads. Too bad. If I ever meet him, I'm gonna kick him in the .... cause he wasted an hour of my time! (okay, 30 minutes, as I was only half-watching this pile of horse manure.)