Hard drive can't access data, may be corrupted

I have a friend who has a hard drive that he can't access the data on. He says it's a SATA2 hard drive.

He has tried to re-format it (by overwriting, not using a new partition) but he gets an error saying that the data can't be accessed. Also it crashed during one of the attempts. He also tried deleting the partition to save his hard drive (the partition takes up the entire hard drive's capacity) but got the same result. If he attempts to run the already installed Windows 7 on the hard drive it gets past the 'starting windows' screen and then automatically restarts.

This problem started when windows was carrying out an update but the computer shut off before it could complete. Then it was all downhill from there...

Does anybody have any last effort ideas for saving the hard drive and possibly the files on it?

Since I'm speaking for my friend I might not have all of the details, so please let me know if you need any more and I'll try and find out.