The Blind Side

An inspirational, based-on-a-true-story sports movie? We’re there, of course. And this is one of those cases where my tastes agree with those of the movie-going public, because I thought THE BLIND SIDE was one of the best examples of that genre I’ve seen.

No need to talk much about the plot in this one: wealthy white suburban couple takes in hulking, homeless black teenager who becomes a star football player. Lessons are learned. People’s lives are changed. Yes, it proves that real life can be as hokey, sentimental, and predictable as any piece of fiction.

Funny thing, though. As the movie progresses, it turns out those things don’t always matter. I credit that to some really fine acting, top to bottom in the cast, and a very solid script that is by turns surprisingly funny and surprisingly gritty. There’s a fight scene that’s really well done and plenty of good dialogue. I was also very pleased with the football scenes. In nearly every football movie I’ve watched, there comes a point when the filmmakers have the characters do something really stupid, something that would never happen in a real football game, simply to make things more dramatic. Not here, though. As far as I could tell, everything was very realistic.

Of course, I could wax rhapsodic about how beautiful Sandra Bullock is, but at this late date, what’s the point? Didn’t she win the Academy Award for this movie? (How quickly they forget!) I really liked her performance, especially the scenes where she’s getting in people’s faces and reading them the riot act. Good stuff.

So yeah, you’ll probably know everything that’s going to happen in this movie, but it’s done so well it works anyway. I thought THE BLIND SIDE was very entertaining and highly recommend it if you haven’t seen it yet.