Restoration

Restoration_(1995) ,WEB_MKV_H264(Miramax,Eng,Lat,Sub) 1280x718

-Dr. Merivel. -In a moment.

-Doctor! -In a moment!

-Merivel, we must move on. -I've sprinkled the lavell in to heal.

This will strengthen the hand. We must not allow the tendons to atrophy.

-Merivel! -I'll return this afternoon.

Old Mr. Parr is suffering from an extreme shortness of breath.

-What do you prescribe? -Let's try some syrup of sage flower.

-Doctor! Doctor! -Citron pills to relieve coughing.

-Doctor! -I shall be with you presently, Mr. Watchurst.

-I'm starving. -You can't be.

-I am. -You've already eaten.

I had a piece of bread and scarcely any cheese.

There's no time to eat!

For the five years we've worked here, there is never time to eat.

There is no time to drink. There is no time, even, to look after our patients.

Doctor! Doctor Merivel!

Samuel needs you.

Sam-Samuel! Samuel! Look... Look at me!

It's Robert. It's Robert. Quiet now. Be quiet. Be quiet.

Merivel! You must see to Parr. He'll only accept comfort from you.

Give him a complice for his head and some chamomile.

Mr. Parr!

Mr. Parr, tell me how you're feeling.

Is there hope I will get well again?

There is always hope.

You must rest and allow my medicines to do their work.

Dr. Merivel! Doctor!

I-I do what I can to treat them.

But our science gives us no hope of curing most of them,

and I am frustrated!

No, I'm... frightened.

Of what?

Their faith and my ignorance.

That is why you prefer a life of debauchery.

Your mother died believing you were a man of honor.

And I beg her pardon every night, and I am at the hospital every day for her.

You mean your whoring is interrupted daily by the care of the sick.

You've not come to me for money to spend on your medicines.

Indeed I have, in a sense.

The five shillings I require are for...

well, for a pawnbroker so I can redeem my case of instruments.

Father, I am sorry to confess it.

-You should be damned for it. -I should.

Look. Look at these hands. Look at them.

Worked to the bone for your case of instruments,

for your teachers and for the books on your table.

Or have they been pawned too?

So that the son of a glove maker...

should not be denied the use of those gifts...

which marked you as a physician before you could spell "physic".

My gifts?

Your gifts, Robert.

Oh, yes, my gifts.

My first patient was a frog. I cured him of jumping.

Now I can cure people of breathing.

My gifts, Father, bring me to dark despair in dark rooms...

so I can hear joy in the street.

The King is restored to us, the theaters are open,

the tailors and wig makers are happy as whores...

and rich men go to heaven again.

I would like to shake the King's hand.

Take the hand of your friend Pearce, Robert.

He is the example to follow.

He may dress like a crow,

but he once infected himself with scarlet fever,

the better to study the disease.

Well, in my own small way, I'm doing the same for the clap.

Look at this glove. Touch it.

This glove is for the King.

And that is the closest you will ever get...

to touching the hand of the King of England.

Here are your five shillings.

Redeem your case of instruments.

And if you've a heart,

redeem your gift, Robert.

Thank you, Father.

And don't spend the money on women.

Merivel! I must prevail on you...

to come to the examining theater this instant.

I won't be a moment, Pearce.

Merivel!

He's probably fled because of your antics.

Pearce, you must not take my romping as an affront to you.

I simply answer the call of nature.

Yes, well, your nature, like mine, is very much fallen.

That awful truth ought to go somewhere

towards discouraging your unsightly bouts of debauchery.

I suppose you're right. But I do very much enjoy them.

This is the fellow.

Shall I unbuckle?

Please, yes.

Good God!

A fracture of the ribs occasioned by a fall from his horse...

was brought to a terrible suppuration.

The doctors feared it would never heal.

You can see the sconce of the old ulcer at the edge here.

Yes.

Merivel, we are witnessing a living, beating heart.

Might a man touch it with his hand?

No one has ever dared.

Yes. Yes?

Sir?

I cannot.

-Pearce, it's just... -Please! I mean... Just please...

Perhaps your friend.

Are you not afraid?

I'm beyond fear, sir. Are you?

You're touching the organ, sir?

Can you not feel my grip?

I feel nothing at all.

No pain?

Nothing.

Tell me, who is the young doctor?

Robert Merivel, Your Majesty.

You will summon him to the palace this very afternoon.

Watch where you're going, you fool!

Your stockings.

It's the young doctor, Your Majesty.

Do you know why I've summoned you here?

I...

A great heaviness hangs over me...

causing me a most abject desperation.

Someone very close to me is dying.

Someone without whom I cannot live.

My doctors have bled her repeatedly;

have tried, without success, lesions, emetics and purges.

Shaved the hair off her body in order to cup her.

But she does not rally.

You are my final hope, Merivel.

If you can cure her, I will offer you a place here as a court physician.

And if I fail?

You must not fail.

Her name is Lou Lou.

"Lou Lou", Your Majesty?

Your own name, by the way, has a very pleasing cadence.

Thank you, Sire.

Merivel. Very pretty to the ear.

Lou Lou?

Oh, my darling is not well.

Come, Merivel.

Call for any medicines, anything you deem suitable.

You will stay until the little creature recovers.

Of course.

Do not disappoint me, Merivel.

I shall not, Sire.

There was a time she would've answered me.

What have they done to you?

My dear Pearce,

by the time you read this letter my fate will be sealed.

This morning, my future never glowed so bright,

and now it is sputtering out in the life of a sick spaniel.

If I save her, my life will be changed utterly.

If she dies, I may as well go with her.

I think of our great teacher, William Harvey.

Though I was often drunk at his lectures, I remember his cry:

"Trust in the power of nature".

Is that the best hope now, for Lou Lou and me?

To let her sleep and give nature a chance to work quietly within her?

But what if I'm wrong?

How will I explain this prescription to His Majesty?

This is well done. I like you, Merivel.

Yours is a curious and original mind.

And in this new age, originality is of great value.

We shall open our palace to you, Merivel...

its treasures and temptations...

and we shall see what you make of yourself.

Thank you, Sire.

You have been given an extraordinary opportunity for one of your rank.

Haven't I? I have...

-You must at every moment please the King. -That would mean...

-If you do not, suffice it to say, I shall be watching. -Good.

Now it is my task to lay out for you your life in this place.

This shall be your lodging.

The royal tailors will be continually at your disposal.

And these shall be your playfellows.

This paper sets forth the following duties for one Robert Merivel, physician:

The daily care and comfort of the 18 royal dogs...

with, as required, the right to perform operations upon them.

It's ten years wasted. I'm warning you, your life will be undone.

No, not wasted, Pearce, for those years have brought me to this new life.

I'm to the palace, and that's an end of it.

My dear, we must be pleased for each other.

You must be pleased for my appointment...

as I am pleased that you have, uh, given up drinking sack.

And found my peace in Quakerism.

Even so, Pearce. Even so.

My dear Pearce,

a year has passed most profitably and pleasurably,

leaving me no moment in which to write to you.

All day I am thick in the affairs of state,

yet I manage to employ my medical knowledge...

especially in anatomy... in the services of the King,

who's particularly fond of my trick of farting at will.

I am Aeolius,

King of the Winds!

That my dear departed father could see me now,

for the King shows me a flattering affection...

that stems, I suspect, from my ability to amuse him.

Our physician has become our fool.