Blindness

Pointless, 25 November 2008

Author: gary-444 from United Kingdom


*** This review may contain spoilers ***


The book may be an insightful deep exploration of the physical impact,and metaphorical opportunities, posed by blindness.The film is a wasted effort.Despite a compelling performance by Julianne Moore, she cannot save a messy screenplay, poor dialogue and inadequate exploration of a good idea.

The opening act starts brightly, a Japanese man is struck blind, but robbed by an apparent Good Samaritan.His native speech adds to our confusion mirroring his confusion from his blindness.Then others are struck down, and the story drifts out of control.At the heart of this is poor characterisation. Despite a two hour running time we don't really get to know any of the characters, let alone like them.

The main action takes place in an isolation block, despite the increasingly desperate conditions little empathy is generated for the main players. A parallel plot then unfolds of the degeneration of their isolated society as allegory for the wider world.Moore plays the sighted wife of an incarcerated Doctor there to look after her husband, the only one with sight, offering great dramatic possibilities, which are largely squandered.After an hour I started to get bored. In order to ratchet up interest a "group rape" scene is introduced in which some women seek to "earn" food for the others from a band of ne'er do wells who have seized control.So tedious had the narrative become that I was as accepting as their menfolk.

The denouement is farcical.They "escape" their "secure" quarters simply because the guards have deserted, presumably blind too, but not before ensuring that everything is unlocked.Then they wander around a bit.By this time i was tapping my watch to see whether it was still going and thought to myself "this will end with them suddenly regaining their sight again" - and it did.

Bleak and boring, lacking dramatic contrast, Director Fernando Meirelles previous work has largely been TV work. It shows.He is hopelessly out of his depth in a feature length.