Brain Injuries Inspiration For New Movie

Concussions are a serious injury caused by a traumatic blow to the head. This MTBI (mild traumatic brain injury) is becoming much more common. The number of U.S. cases has soared to over 3 million. I’ve even had one myself! With more and more youths becoming interested in athletics, concussion safety is more important than ever. Such sports as lacrosse, football, hockey, soccer, and even basketball are responsible for many of these head injuries, since they involve contact.

A new system has proved more reliable than other tests. Called imPACT, it offers a web-based method of testing. This is not just any site, though. Anchored with medical professionals, imPACT has helped to diagnose over 800,000 undetected concussions in the last year. Think about that. 800,000 people saved from further problems with their brain.

Now, as imPACT is gaining widespread support, more and more institutions are beginning to adapt it as a primary concussion detector. Yet, thousands of people don’t understand how damaging to a person this injury is. Famous athletes such as Muhammad Ali, Junior Seau, and Joe Montana have all suffered damaging head injuries. We can only hope that athletes “use their heads”, and avoid violent hits from now on.

With concussion issues being a source of serious water cooler conversations on Monday mornings throughout the U.S. and the world, Miramax Films’ Concussion should opens millions of more eyes to the dangers of head trauma.  This was an excellent movie. It tells the story of Dr. Bennet Omalu (Will Smith) who discovers a football player dead in his truck. Discovering extreme brain damage in the player, Omalu names the condition (CTE) and publishes a paper on his findings. This paper is dismissed by the NFL. With three of his friends (superbly played by Alec Baldwin, Alec Brooks, Eddie Marsan) Omalu sets out to change the NFL’s view on head damage.

What happens? Though many of us already have read about or are aware of many of our injured heroes’ plights as a result of their violent exploits on the field, the big-screen climax is still rather shocking! Inspired performances by Will Smith and Luke Wilson (Roger Goodell) helped propel this movie to greatness. Altogether, this film ranked high on my chart. My rating would be 8.5/10. Well done!