In 1970s Portland, Oregon, Richard Pimentel realizes he has a remarkable gift for public speaking. Pimentel's idol is College Bowl founder Dr. Padrow, but upon trying out for Dr. Padrow, the ambitious young speaker is informed that he won't have anything to talk about until he has lived a full life. Realizing that there is some merit to Dr. Padrow's observation, Pimentel subsequently enlists in the military and prepares for duty in Vietnam. Later, while fighting on the battlefield, Pimentel loses most of his hearing and is left with permanent tinnitus. He returns home frustrated, and enrolls at Portland State University. When others inform him that he will never achieve his dreams because he is deaf, the determined veteran makes it his mission to prove them wrong. But it is not as much about changing others' perceptions of persons with disabilities as it is about altering their perceptions of themselves, and with a little help from foul-mouthed genius Art Honeyman , free-spirited beauty Christine, and mercurial, hard-drinking veteran Mike Stoltz, Pimentel plays a pivotal role in creating the Americans With Disabilities Act.
Filming of Music Within took place primarily in Portland, Oregon, including the Portland State University campus.
Critical response
Kirk Honeycutt of The Hollywood Reporter noted: "Music Within will hook the audience up with a supremely cool and witty real-life character, Richard Pimentel...what should be a tough, sentimental slog whisks by in a breezy, entertaining 94 minutes like a kind of illustrated stand-up comedy routine." Matt Seitz of The New York Times, however, called the film's direction "annoyingly unimaginative," ultimately deeming it "a bad movie with a good heart." Reviewing the film for Slant Magazine, Nick Schager awarded it two out of four stars, noting: "Livingston, a consistently appealing presence who exudes unpretentious everyman charm, successfully sells even the corniest of scenarios—the most groan-worthy of which is a discriminatory pancake house offense that, per uplifting melodramatic requirements—is rectified 20 years later with some heartwarming syrup." Roger Ebert called the film "entertaining" and "sometimes inspiring," but added: "What bothers me is that Music Within takes an individual story, an inspiring one, yes, and then thinks that's all there is to be told. It wasn't one guy who got mad. It was decades of struggle, decades of rejection, decades of streets that couldn't be crossed, stairs that couldn't be climbed, houses that couldn't be lived in and customers who couldn't be bothered."
