I love this movie so much

Absolutely Fantastic

if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

George Malley (John Travolta) is the nice owner of the local auto repair shop. Everybody likes him and there's a party at the local bar for his birthday. He likes Lace Pennamin (Kyra Sedgwick) but she resists complicating her kids' lives. As he leaves the party, he is struck down by a bright light. He slowly finds his mind expanding and develops telekinetic abilities. Nobody really believes him at first. He is supported by friends Nate Pope (Forest Whitaker), Tito and Doc Brunder (Robert Duvall). He predicts an earthquake. Prof. John Ringold (Jeffrey DeMunn) is a seismologist who comes to investigate. The townfolks turn from bemusement to bewilderment to suspicion. Nate has been sending radio messages for George who deciphered a top secret code and the FBI arrests them.The insistence to keep a light upbeat tone keeps the inherit tension very low for the first half. I like the story but director Jon Turteltaub keeps it from being taken serious. I like the love story and the overall story. I don't find the light tone that compelling. This is basically a superhero origin story and I'm all for it. The locals are too idiotic and too simplistic. It's too easy. Also the FBI threatening the professor is a bit too easy. It's more in line with a simple comic book. I just wish it treated this imaginary world more seriously and with more subtlety.

I had never seen this movie and always thought it was disappointing. Well, i was horribly wrong! Great acting performance by John Travolta. He plays the character of George Malley with great depth. He really IS George Malley and you will see a completely different John Travolta. The environment and scenery in Pasadena California of the movie fits the story perfectly. Also Forest Whitaker plays his character very well. Robert Duval completes the story as the father figure. The story-line is really inspiring and shows you that love conquers all. The relation between George and Lace is beautiful and shows two people in love with each other despite all troubles of the everyday life. Enjoyed this movie and the story. I really think this one of his (John Travolta) best movies.

Many people seem to feel this is a movie about John Travolta's philosophical belief system, Scientology or Dianetics or whatever it is, but, if so, it all got past me because I don't know what either of them is.To me, it seemed like a contrived, commercially oriented, and successful feel-good story about an ordinary auto mechanic in a small California town who sees a flash of light one night, turns into a paranormal wizard, and then dies happy in the arms of the true love he's been courting but who has been keeping him at arms' length.I kept trying to identify its sources, aside from "The Twilight Zone," which we can take for granted -- especially the episode called "Mr. Dingle, The Strong." Let's see. The general idea is lifted from "Field of Dreams," only this is episodic instead of linear and lacks the happy climactic bonding of son and deceased father. I mean, each of the protagonists has a weird experience alone in a farming community, after which he becomes obsessed and hypomanic, and the local Sons of the Soil regard him as nuts. Then, in the odd ball villagers, there is a touch of "Northern Exposure" and "Rocket Gibraltar," the film to which the television series owes a good deal. The structure runs parallel to "Charlie." I think maybe the jumbo but pathetic monster of Frankenstein may be stretching things too far.Travolta is convincing enough as the cheerful, modest, perceptive brain tumor victim. I liked Kyra Sedgewick because she fits the role of the single mother with two children who wants to keep her life uncomplicated out here in the wilderness of buff hills and bunch grass. Forest Whitaker is fine as the recluse -- the only black guy in town as far as we can tell -- who seems to be Travolta's sole friend in this village. Robert Duvall's part is relatively small but he lends it more energy than he has in any of his other recent films.The FBI, academia, and famous brain surgeons provide the villains. "The most famous brain surgeon in the world" is Richard Kiley who tries to persuade Travolta to let him operate on his brain while it's still working, though it may not even prolong his life, let alone save it. Travolta could open new doors. Travolta replies to this importuning with: "You don't get it, do you? You have one hand on technology and one hand on science and you have nothing left for the human spirit." I'm on the side of Richard Kiley. Let them go ahead and peel open my head. The worst (or the best) that could happen is that you expire painlessly while in deep anesthesia. The alternative, which Travolta chooses, is to die at Kyra Sedgewick's farmhouse with its vista of live oaks under blazing blue skies. Yet, death from an astrocytoma is a horrible death. You don't die peacefully. You vomit, act irrationally, lose your wits, wind up immobilized, and suffer excruciating pain. The ending is a fantasy.It struck me as a tale aimed at the heart rather than the head, as Woody Allen once put it. There are pop songs about love and self actualization played over long scenes of smooching and driving around in a beat-up old pick up truck. It was all a bit much.

This movie was in my cable last week and for some reason, I never heard about it. "Phenomenon" isn't a known movie in Brazil, but that didn't stop me watching it. In the first minutes, John Travolta's character gains a strange power that makes him extremely intelligent. For obvious reasons, people start threatening him, living up to the famous phrase "the nail that sticks out gets hammered". Cast has common performances, with highlight to the bar fighting scenes. Even thought the plot doesn't get deeply into a romance or anything, we have beautiful messages and thoughts about life in general; George Malley is a great character and sometimes I could identify myself with him. The ending is beautiful and not that cliché. Worth it.