TV MOVIE REVIEW : ‘David’ Packs an Emotional Wallop

The scene is a hospital burn ward, silence interrupted only by the sighs and beeps of life-support machines. Looking more like a stuffed polar bear cub than a boy, David Rothenberg lies hidden beneath layers of gauze, his body an open wound.

His mother says nothing as she gently tapes a school portrait of her grinning 6-year-old son to the monitor above his bed, then strokes his bandaged head. The unspoken statement, a reminder to herself and to those nursing him back to life: this is still a person.

Void of dialogue, that brief gesture packs as much emotional horsepower as any other in “David,” a two-hour movie airing tonight at 9 on ABC (Channels 7, 3, 10,42). Like the rest of the movie, the scene’s potency lies in understatement. The movie recognizes that sometimes words are simply inadequate for hope and acceptance and a mother’s love of a child who will call himself a monster at first glance.

There are poignant scenes aplenty in this movie, based on Marie Rothenberg’s book with Mel White about the near-fatal burning of her son in a 1983 fire set by David’s father. Hollywood seems to specialize in cheap “inspirational” movies about the wounded who beat the odds; this one, however, never stoops to cheap sentiment--no small feat.

“David” is a true story that actually lets the compelling facts do the talking.

With a few exceptions--most notably the ending--it is honest and accurate where it counts, and I say this having covered the Rothenberg tragedy since the morning of the fire on March 3, 1983.

Where so many TV movies soften the edges of an ugly situation, screenwriter Stephanie Liss and director John Erman leave them a little rough, offering glimpses of a first-grader as the sometimes difficult boy he could be, while his parents battled for his undivided devotion.

Marie has--gasp!-- faults that are displayed. And despite the heinous act that Charles Rothenberg commited, the man is portrayed as the neurotic-but-doting parent he was.

This is first-class film making. Even the inferno scene is handled with sensitivity, though it is gripping stuff.

Bernadette Peters, her voluminous hair cinched into a subdued braid, stars as Marie Rothenberg in a performance that is both convincing and remarkably dead-on, capturing the divorcee’s vulnerability and grittiness with restraint.

John Glover does a fine job as a whiny, paranoid, pathetic Charles Rothenberg, though I was initially disappointed with what seemed to be a one-dimensional character.

Riveting right down to David’s raspy voice is Matthew Lawrence, top-notch as the burned boy whose uphill fight to survive disfiguring third-degree burns over 90% of his body captured the public spotlight.

There isn’t a false performance among the supporting cast, which includes cameos of at least one burn survivor I recognized and David’s own plastic surgeon, Dr. Bruce Achauer. Especially good is Dan Lauria as John Cirillo, Marie’s decent-cop fiance struggling unsuccessfully to cope with the overwhelming pressure.

Some viewers may have trouble watching shots of the boy once he is unveiled, burns and all. Oscar and Emmy-award winning Michael Westmore, as well as Gerald Quist did the impressive make-up.

The movie’s ending takes the sharpest veer from reality. Rather than the uplifting tone of the TV version, the mood of David’s release from the hospital was quiet and depressing. David didn’t walk out of the UC Irvine Burn Center, he was rolled out in a wheelchair and lifted into a car. And though they are featured in the farewell scene, Martinez and David’s physical therapist stayed away from work until he was gone because they couldn’t bear to say good-bye. But that’s nit-picking.

The movie closes with recent photos of David Rothenberg, a touch that I loved. It otherwise leaves David in 1983, at age 6, with only an unsatisfying epilogue saying the 12-year-old likes ice cream, punk rock and skateboarding.

Also noticeably absent in the epilogue is a profound footnote: Charles Rothenberg is expected to be paroled from prison in 13 1/2 months.