Two months ago my wife, Barb, and I were invited to lunch at the home of friends with several other people. One fellow, an excellent conversationalist, discussed some of the articles I have written with me. At one point he asked me if I had written any movie reviews. I said that I had not, at which time he was so enthusiastic about a movie he had recently seen entitled “Something the Lord Made” that it seemed almost like he was giving me an assignment to view the film and write about it.
Barb is a prolific reader and every time she wants to tell me about a book she is reading, I ask her to summarize the book in 20 words or less because I either don’t particularly care for the genre of the book or I don’t want to know all the details because I may read it. Try as she might, Barb usually can’t control her enthusiasm by limiting the number of words she uses. I found that the fellow at lunch and Barb have much in common. Despite his wife’s pleading, he used the 20 word rule, except it was exponential in the 20 word count! However, to his credit, he did recommend a wonderful movie.
“Something the Lord Made” was written by Joseph Sargent and produced by HBO Films in 2004. The telemovie was based on a true story that began in 1930 in segregated Nashville, Tennessee. The two stars of the film are Dr. Alan Blalock (played by Alan Rickman), a white surgeon and medical researcher, and Vivien Thomas (played by Mos Def – Thomas’s first name is a female name but his parents were hoping for a daughter, thus he was stuck with the name), an African American who was a skilled carpenter. I would like to give you the flavor of the movie by expounding on the following:
Vivien, a handsome man who was smart, ambitious and had recently graduated from high school, was planning to enroll at Tennessee State College and become a doctor, until the bank where he had been saving his college funds for seven years folded during the depression. After being let go from his carpenter’s job because the other men needed the money more than he (because they were married and had children), he felt fortunate to obtain a position at Vanderbilt College in the medical research lab with the responsibility of keeping the lab clean. Although living modestly with his parents, Vivien maintained his appearance of a doctor by wearing a white shirt and tie to work each day. Before long, he started to study the medical books that were in the lab. Although faced with the discrimination of the day (stepping off the sidewalk to let whites past, sitting in the back of the bus, being made to enter the back door of the hospital to get to his workplace), Vivien accepted his fate.
Dr. Alan Blalock, a seemingly excellent mentor for Vivien, had noticed his intelligence and highly skilled eye/hand coordination, and he lived the life of a wealthy, highly respected surgeon/researcher. He ran in the best of circles and was driven for the accolades he received from the medical world. He depended on Vivien so much that he asked Vivien, who was now married, to move and take a position with him at Johns Hopkins Hospital, where Dr. Blalock was Chair of Surgery. Over the many years they worked together, Vivien was paid on a lower scale than he should have been (early in his career) and was accustomed to the outbursts of Dr. Blalock, which were fueled by his ego. Despite Dr. Blalock’s wife’s encouragement to pay for Vivien’s college education, he declined.
The results of the two men working together for many years was what they learned about how the heart functions and how they could perform operations on it to save lives, initially with blue babies (those not receiving enough blood through the heart). Vivien was able to make this possible by using his “McGiverish” skills to make the proper tools to accomplish this feat. Prior to this, it was thought that the heart was “hands off” when it came to surgery. When the film was released in 2004, there were roughly 1,750,000 cardiac surgeries done in the United States because of their research and successful operations.
The moral of the story: The title ‘Something the Lord Made’ is a bit misleading, since He is the Creator of all! However, I believe the title is apropos because the movie mainly is referring to Vivien, who, it was believed by many was inferior, just because of his skin color. For the longest time, few could see what else God had blessed him with: intelligence, skill and the ability to persevere when the going was tough. If only we, creations of God, could get to know people of different color, ethnic groups and backgrounds, the world would be so much better. You will have to view the DVD to find out if Vivien ever received the recognition he deserved for his accomplishments.
What a “heart” warming story!Note: If you would like to view this DVD, it is available in the Chester County and Berks County Library systems (and possibility others).
Jeff Hall, of Honey Brook, contributes columns to Berks-Mont Newspapers. Questions/comments may be directed to jeffreyhall77@comcast.net.
