Threshold, the Artificial Heart, and the Blurred Line Between Medicine and Science Fiction

When I was researching the very much-forgotten early 1980s medical drama Threshold — starring Donald Sutherland and Jeff Goldblum — I wondered why it’s often tagged as both drama and science fiction. At first glance, Threshold feels like a serious medical story grounded in real-world cardiac science, not a genre-bender. But perhaps history itself has reframed the story.

Threshold went into production when the idea of an artificial heart was still largely theoretical — a dream circulating in medical labs rather than a reality. By the time the film arrived in theaters, that dream had momentarily existed, but not in the way anyone had truly hoped.

From Dentist to Medical History

Barney Clark was an ordinary dentist from Seattle whose life took an extraordinary turn. At age 61, he suffered from severe congestive heart failure so debilitating that he struggled to walk from his bedroom to his bathroom. His condition was so advanced that, by the standards of the day, he was not eligible for a traditional heart transplant.

Enter Dr. William C. DeVries, a cardiac surgeon working at the University of Utah, and a device developed by Dr. Robert Jarvik and colleagues known as the Jarvik-7 — a plastic and metal artificial heart designed to fully replace the human heart’s function. On December 2, 1982, Clark became the first person ever to receive this artificial heart, implanted in a surgery that lasted several hours and captivated the world.

Rather than being a simple life-saving machine, the Jarvik-7 required Clark to be tethered to a large external air compressor console, roughly the size and weight of a household appliance, to power its pneumatic functions. He never left the hospital during the months that followed.

The Price of Pioneering

Clark lived 112 days after the surgery, surviving longer than doctors initially expected but enduring significant suffering along the way. He experienced repeated infections, seizures, kidney failure, and ongoing complications as his body fought both the device and the many ways illness manifests when a dying heart is replaced by machinery.

It’s telling that much of the early media coverage focused on the breakthrough — the fact that Clark was still alive at all — rather than the grim realities of his daily condition. Ethicists even criticized the consent process as confusing and incomplete.

Clark’s own attitude was complex. He hoped his ordeal would push science forward and make the artificial heart a viable option for others. But the public story of triumph was always at odds with what actually happened behind closed hospital doors.

When Reality Overshadows Fiction

Clark died on March 23, 1983, of complications related to his condition and the artificial heart. His death came at a moment when Threshold had already been released in Canada and was awaiting its U.S. premiere.

Threshold’s plot — about doctors taking desperate measures to implant an experimental artificial heart — suddenly echoed real headlines. Yet while the film ends on a hopeful note, with Mare Winningham’s character walking out of the hospital after a successful operation, reality was far less neat and uplifting.

Why Threshold Crosses into Science Fiction

By the time the movie played in America, the real artificial heart episode was already treated as a cautionary tale. Even though Clark survived for months with the Jarvik-7, the device never became a true permanent solution to heart failure. Its FDA approval was later withdrawn in 1990 amid quality control concerns, and artificial hearts today are mostly used as temporary support devices while patients wait for donor hearts.

Modern versions of mechanical hearts and assist devices exist — and continue evolving — but the fully self-contained, long-lasting heart that early pioneers envisioned remains elusive. That tension between hope and limitation is what pushes Threshold out of pure medical drama and into speculative territory. The film reflects not just what was known then but what was imagined — and, in hindsight, how much farther we still have to go.

So yes: Threshold is a drama rooted in real science — and also science fiction. Because sometimes, reality is stranger, bolder, and more unsettled than any screenplay can contain.

Star Rating: ★★★☆☆

Not for quality alone — but for ambition, relevance, and historical resonance.