THE BLIND SIDE

John Lee Hancock's "The Blind Side" has a Nick Drake song playing over the opening credits. This is a great omen for the rest of the movie because of the use of this wonderful singer's song right? Wrong. "The Blind Side" is about a Michael Oher, a huge, undereducated boy from the bad part of Memphis who is picked up by a rich mother of two (Sandra Bullock) and given the chance to play football in college. Oher then gets drafted into the NFL and becomes a highly paid starter. Now how can Hancock make this inspirational and true story into a poorly made film? Very easily it turns out.

Hancock (who wrote and directed the film) does nothing special here. His directing is a little below par, and his writing is atrocious. The dialogue seems extremely forced and the plot moves at a sluggish pace. Hancock seems to be conflicted over who to focus on throughout the movie too. With the incredible star power of Sandra Bullock, it is hard to make Oher the actual main focus of the film (who is very well acted by Quinton Aaron), and thus the movie veers off into many unneeded side plots and scenes of both characters.For instance, there are some unneeded scenes with Bullock and her bigot housewife friends at a fancy restaurant. These housewives are meant to be an opposing force to Bullock's actions of taking in Oher and letting him live with her and her family. These scenes drag on and are pointless, it is already clear that she is doing a brave and noble thing so there is no need to waste twenty minutes trying to show it off in front of uncaring housewives.


Even Oher's childhood story is pushed aside for Bullock's star power. There are only flashes of his childhood in the film, and they lead to a conclusion that is revealed in the first third of the film. It takes the entire movie to show all the flashes put together into one scene though, and there is a feeling of being jipped by the end. There is a tiny subplot about one of Oher's friends. Even though he was athletically gifted, he dropped out of school, joined a gang, and was killed on his 21st birthday (I want to see that movie!). This is never developed though, in favor of some scenes between Bullock and her husband arguing over what to do with Oher.


Bullock tries to pull off the tough-and-loving mom role, but comes off just tough. There are all the family-film cliches though. Bullock has some "funny" dialogue showing off her command in the household (her husband sleeps on the couch "when he's bad" and other poorly written lines). There is also the racist football player who lines up against Oher in a high school football game. This provides a group hatred for him in the theater and a collective gasp when he calls Oher a "black piece of crap" (intense I know). There is also the funny little son who helps Oher train provides comic "relief" which is more like punishment than anything else. The only good performance in the film is Quinton Aaron. His portrayal of Oher is very real and sincere, if underused by Hancock.

The film, at the end of the day, is simply boring. The story is real though, and nothing can take that from the film. If you want to see and family-friendly inspirational holiday film, this is for you. It is very long though, and dry, and not very good.

Verdict: DON'T SEE IT

*.5/***** (1.5/5 stars)