REVIEW: The Blind Side (2009)

The Blind Side

Rated: PG-13

Starring: Sandra Bullock, Quinton Aaron

Runtime: 128 minutes

My Raiting: 2 stars

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Sandra Bullock's voice, masked by a “distinctly southern accent” opens The Blind Side describing Joe Theissman's career-ending injury. She then says this:

“The ideal left tackle is big, but a lot of people are big. He is wide in the butt and massive in the thighs. He has long arms, giant hands and feet as quick as a hiccup.”

She is describing Michael Oher (Quinton Aaron). We see him walking in the projects, a giant of a high school senior. She, Leigh Anne (Bullock), is about to save his life.

A good movie – no, a great movie – is promised in those words. What we get is a cliché-ridden glory story filled with nonsense.

A football coach says to an official: “This young man plays for my team and I will defend him like he's my own son! Against you or any other sonofabitch.”

Oher responds, “Don't worry, Coach. I got your back.”

Think of the most ridiculous, over-the-top orchestral music and insert it behind those words. Do you like what you hear? I was nauseated.

I understand these words and that music need to be in films like this. I get it. Audiences must be told how to feel. I have a problem when both exist in scene after scene. I have a problem with writer-director John Lee Hancock for taking a nearly unbelievable true story and fumbling it with the screenplay.

We hear Sandra Bullock's voice again near the end of the film:

“That could have been my son, Michael.”

There's now a clean-up in aisle three.

Call me insensitive. Do it. The Blind Side is an underdog story with a telegraphed ending that even the trailer doesn't bother disguising.

Leigh Anne is married to a multiple fast-food chain owner. The family is beyond wealthy. They take in Oher and change his life. That is all the plot entails.

There is almost no struggle. There are no arguments save a minor one near the end. There isn't a conflict of any sort. Oher seems willing to be changed and, really, the only issue is how to get this enormous African-American man on a football scholarship.

That takes only Bullock saying, “Pretend I'm your quarterback. When you look at him, you think of me. You are protecting me.”

Insert more violins and a few tissues passed around the audience and you have the No. 1 film in the country.

For me, The Blind Side is a major disappointment. There is so much depth to the actual story Hancock refuses to explore. We see little of Oher's life previous to his discovery. His past, I suppose, is up to our imagination.

We know he is orphaned, sort of. His father ran out on the family and his mother is a drug addict. He is a child of the state. We know a few gang-like people are after him for unknown reasons.

Otherwise, everything is happy-go-lucky in Oher's life, now that he has Leigh Anne. Let us all sing her praises.

Me? I was unleashing dramatic sighs in the theater. A couple times an “Oh come on!” spewed out of my mouth. I am not ashamed to admit it.

Bullock's performance is the only noteworthy thing about The Blind Side. But even her best acting in years couldn't save the words she was forced to say. Two stars.