Awakenings is a 1990 American biographical drama film directed by Penny Marshall and written by Steven Zaillian, based on Oliver Sacks's 1973 memoir. It tells the story of neurologist Dr. Malcolm Sayer, based on Sacks, who discovers the beneficial effects of the drug L-DOPA in 1969. He administers it to catatonic patients who survived the 1919–1930 epidemic of encephalitis lethargica. Leonard Lowe and the rest of the patients are awakened after decades, and have to deal with a new life in a new time. The film stars Robert De Niro, Robin Williams, Julie Kavner, Ruth Nelson, John Heard, Penelope Ann Miller, Peter Stormare and Max von Sydow.

Awakenings was produced by Walter Parkes and Lawrence Lasker, who first encountered Sacks's book as undergraduates at Yale, and optioned it a few years later. Released on December 12, 1990, the film was a critical and commercial success, earning $108.7 million on a $29 million budget. It was nominated for three Academy Awards—Best Picture, Best Actor for De Niro, and Best Adapted Screenplay.