Blindness - Review

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Length: 120 min

Rated: R

Distributor: Miramax Films

Release Date: 2008-10-03

Starring: Julianne Moore, Mark Ruffalo, Danny Glover, Gael García Bernal, Alice Braga, Yusuke Iseya

Directed by Fernando Meirelles

Produced by Andrea Barata Ribeiro, Niv Fichman, Sonoko Sakai

Written by Don McKellar

Visit the movie's Official Site!

Reviewed by Katey Rich : 2008-09-24 23:57:26

For his second English-language film, Fernando Meirelles, one of the most visually expressive filmmakers working today, has chosen to make a film about people who have gone blind. It would be a sick joke if Meirelles didn't take it so seriously, translating his visual flair into a story that allows the audience a sight that none of the characters, save one, can have. Blindness, an adaptation of Jose Saramago's allegorical novel, is a brutal slog in some parts, but it also powerfully lifts the veil on human decency, revealing the worms, dirt and brutality that lurk underneath.

The movie starts as some of the best end-of-the-world stories do, with unrelated residents of an unnamed city suddenly, inexplicably going blind. Chief among them is The Doctor (Mark Ruffalo), who treats the first man struck with the blindness (Yusuke Iseya) and goes blind himself the next day. Though the Doctor's Wife (Julianne Moore) is not blind herself, she goes with her husband to a quarantine facility, where they are joined by increasingly more victims of what's being called "The White Sickness." We see various news reports and government summits trying to solve the crisis, but soon we are trapped within the crumbling mental facility that grows ever more crowded with the blind.

The only sighted person in the building, the Doctor's Wife is the only one to bear witness of the fetid, miserable cell, and she and her husband do their best to maintain order and a sense of democracy. But as food shipments grow scarcer, and the outside world seemingly abandons them, a man who dubs himself the King of Ward Three (Gael Garcia Bernal) stages a coup, hoarding food and demanding bribes from the other wards. At first it's jewelry, but soon women from each ward are being recruited as collateral.

Filming so much of his movie inside cramped, disgusting quarters, Meirelles makes the most of his camera, washing out the film's colors to emulate the "white" blindness, using quick cuts and all kinds of crazy camera angles both to convey the sense of growing madness in the hospital and emphasize the audience's gift of sight. There's an issue of voyeurism here, in what the audience can see that the characters cannot, but Meirelles unfortunately ignores it for the large part. Had he indicted the audience as voyeur, as Hitchcock and so many horror directors have done, he could have truly distinguished his film from the novel; instead the literary roots stick to the film a little too closely, particularly in the conceit of giving no names to its characters.

Bear with me while I get a little theoretical here. Allegories work in novels, and have for centuries, because characters that exist only in your mind can stand for anything-- pigs can stand for Russian communists, the Salem Witch Trials can stand for McCarthyism, etc. But film is exceedingly literal, with each character represented by a single actor, so that the Doctor's Wife may be intended as a larger symbol of humanity, but is always also Julianne Moore. In that way the scale of Blindness becomes diminished, a story about one nightmare in one quarantine ward, rather than the sweeping metaphor the novel likely is.

The stellar performances (particularly from Moore, Ruffalo and Bernal), impeccable production design and stirring, though occasionally flashy, cinematography make Blindness worth the suffering it inflicts on its audiences. It doesn't quite reach the allegorical, accusatory heights it seems to aim for, but it offers a chance for stark reflection, and invites the audience to make the leap from the fictional blindness to whatever real-life disaster is happening today. A sharp view of humanity with a glimmer of hope, Blindness is a movie for our times-- flawed, brutal, with key moments of brilliance.

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amw
April 25, 2009 at 03:50

i just watched the movie and I am shocked by some of these reviews. I thought the movie was great. The movie isnt about why they became blind but what they do now that they are. Not the cause but the effect. Some parts hit me right at my core. It is hard to watch someone who CAN do something about the situation, but chooses not to. But that is a part of life and it happens all the time. Its not a far fetched idea. Anyway, I thought the movie was great and I would recommend it to everyone.

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Jumpy
April 24, 2009 at 21:51

I rented this movie last weekend, and I am a little stunned by some of the negative reviews here. Is this really a site for film afficionados? I found "Blindness" to be thought-provoking, well-directed and as realistic as most any other armageddon-type film. Whether it's worth $20 for two tickets, I can not say, but it was well worth the $1 I paid at Red Box. I would have to agree with the reviewer above who suggested that some of the commenters here simply don't get it. And for the person who suggested that no government would let anything like this happen to its people: how quickly we forget the 20,000 Hurricane Katrina victims who were told to go to the New Orleans Superdome, only to be left for days without sufficient food, electricity or lights, working toilets or sufficient security to police the mayhem. Really... this film isn't realistic?

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ROB
February 20, 2009 at 17:04

Look mate, don't be so up yourself. I (and i'm sure many others) are aware of the further reaching questions about society and humanity etc. Having not read the book i am not going to comment on what message the author may have been trying to make but i will comment on the movie. I understand about allegories etc but the movie didnt do enough to make that leap. This is just a movie about a bunch of blind people that has so many plot holes and logic gaps that i am angry at having wasted $1 plus tax from a red box as well as the time my wife and i took to be subjected to this. This movie makes NO SENSE. Why did Julianne Moore let a blind man rape her? She could have done one of a hundred things-snuck past the "guard" (blind guy with a stick) and taken the food back/ tied people up/ attacked people/ killed people. Rememeber EVERYBODY else is blind so she could have done WHATEVER she wanted to, all anybody would have heard was shuffling, shouts of pain, bodies being dragged along the floor etc. Anyone on Ward 3 would have been powerless even if they jumped her at once BECAUSE THEY ARE BLIND AND SHE CAN SEE!!!!! how would they distinguish between her and a mass of of other people in the middle of a skirmish? You ever played games as a kid where you were blindfolded (like the one when you're spun round three times and have to find people)? My little boy could kick my arse if i was blindfolded, a fully grown woman would know to scratch, knee in the bollocks, bite their knob, whatever it takes she could do BECAUSE SHE CAN SEE!! And in the cluster-f**k of a mass skirmish she could easily escape , leaving all the blind people grabbing each other like a comedy scene from a Jackie Chan movie- BECAUSE SHE CAN SEE!!.
Now even if she was incapable of murder (as lovers of the movie claim as there main arguement, having looked at other forums)there were so many other things she could have done it truly frustrates me. In the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king- well she had both eyes working perfectly, she should have been God but instead allows herself to be raped by a blind man? And what of the men on Ward 1? What a bunch of pussys. Mark Ruffalos' lame speech about his "male pride being hurt" but "what did that really matter" ?!! I'm telling you i would have starved, killed or been killed before allowing anything like that to happen to my wife or child. And what of the people on Ward 3? They were okay with everything? just going along for the ride? Every single person was fine with continual, multiple rapes?! WORST MOVIE EVER

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Cris
November 10, 2008 at 14:03

I cannot say i adored the movie...but i can tell that none of the people who commented here know what it was really about. the movie was not meant to depict a possible real blindness. investigate further on the author and the book on which the movie was based before passing judgement on something that none of you understood.

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Chris
October 15, 2008 at 04:52

BLINDNESS IS ABSOLUTLY THE WORST MOVIE I HAVE EVER SEEN!!! I have seen stupid, pointless movies before, but this crap was by far the biggest waste of $8 and 2 Hrs ever!!! absolutly a huge waste of time and money!!! And it's not that I did not understand it or something like that, it is just the ABSOLUTE WORST MOVIE IN EXISTANCE!!! DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY AND TIME!!! BEWARE OF BLINDNESS BECAUSE YOU WILL WANT TO GO BLIND!!! If you want to know what it is about, here is the plot in lamens terms, a guy goes blind mysteriously, other people go blind mysteriously, the government of some unknown country sends all the blind folks to an old abandoned asylum alone and lock them in alone, the people then startwalking around naked and pissing everywhere, then all the women allow themselves to be raped for food until one guy kills one of the women, then the one woman who can see kills a guy, then they all start killing one another until the building goes up in flames, when they escape and then find everyones blind, then they can all of a sudden see again... And again beware do not waste your time or money on this bullshit!!!

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Johnny
October 12, 2008 at 12:16

I wish I had read the reviews before going to see this CRAP!! Complete garbage I tell you. Goshh I feel like I was robbed. DONT WASTE YOUR MONEY!

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michelle
October 10, 2008 at 18:51

This is the worst movie I have ever seen. DO NOT waste your time or your money. It was so frustrating and redonkulous!

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Jennifer
October 6, 2008 at 13:41

I agree...my boyfriend and I went and seen this...HORRIBLE movie!!! Yes, the actors did a good job, but there seemed to be absolutely no point to the movie.

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Mike
October 5, 2008 at 15:41

This movie was BULLSHIT!!! I can't believe I wasted hard earned money on this film. I don't get it. The movie did not explain the cause of the blindness or why she was the only one that could see. Also, if there was more that could see and why dude was cured at the end. If it wasn't for the titties I saw in da movie, I would've left in da first hour. But, since I spent my money on this shitty ass movie, I stayed to see if there would be a silver lining. Which had no point and no reason why the blindness occured in the first place. I give this film two thumbs and two big toes way the fuck down. Please give me my money back. Whomever reads this, please,I beg of you. Don't make the same mistake I've made. Shit, I damn near wished I went blind after seeing that BULLSHIT!!!

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alex
October 5, 2008 at 13:57

worst movie I ever saw. I watched just 3/4 of movie, I couldn't bare. It is pointless, something that even if in real world could happen that, it is imposible that the goverment of any country treat the people like that. No nurses or doctors in that hospice, the blinds people are just trow in that place and is nobody there to show them the bathroom. so stupid......:). and is that blind guy how wants to lead and he have a gun...omg a blind guy with a gun. and he demands money or electronics like tv's in trade for food. it is not realistic....it is stupid.

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