An Uncommon Kindness: The Father Damien Story on AllMovie

Acclaimed actor Robin Williams narrates this heartfelt look at a Belgian priest whose selfless determination to ease the suffering of others came at the height of Hawaii's horrific leprosy epidemic. The year was 1872 and leprosy was sweeping through the Hawaiian islands. In a desperate bid to isolate the disease and prevent it from spreading any further than it already had, the government quickly established a bleak and remote leprosy settlement on the island of Molokai. Abandoned by their fellow man and forced to live on an island that had no medical care, scarce food, and minimal shelter, the quarantined population of Molokai seemed doomed to die an unimaginable death. Despite the perceived loss of hope in that dark hour, relief would soon come when in 1883 a youthful Belgian priest requested to be transferred to the island in order to care for the ailing leprosy victims. In the years that followed Father Damien would serve as an angel of mercy to hundreds of suffering people whose slow and grueling deaths would have otherwise been as lonely as they were painful.