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One Of Our Spies Has Laid Eyes On Meirelles’s BLINDNESS!
Hey, everyone. ”Moriarty” here.
You lucky sod.
I don’t even want to run your review. That’s how much I hate you for seeing this already.
But come on... in what world am I not interested in early word on the new film from the guy who made CITY OF GOD and THE CONSTANT GARDENER?
I’m intrigued by your chosen spy name. “Joel.” Very enigmatic. Thanks for the review, man. Nicely done.
Last night i went to an advanced screening of "Blindness" a new film by Fernando Meirelles, the director The Constant Gardener.
let me just warn the readers of spoilers in this review/synopsis.
ok. an announcement was made before the screening that this was a video presentation and not 35 mm but that did not really detract from the film. also, at one point there was stock footage instead of whatever they will use, but that too was a minor distraction. otherwise, the production, music and everything else seemed to be close to a finished product.
the film opens immediately with a single man going inexplicably blind with no one really knowing or understanding why it has happened. he comes into contact with people (don mckellar) and his doctor (mark ruffalo) and the doctor's wife (julianne moore).
slowly but surely they too begin to go blind, as does the rest of the city, although no one has an exlpanation as to why it is happening. the nameless faceless government decides they don't want or can't deal with these people and puts them in an asylum to fend for themselves. julianne moore, who does not lose her sight, goes in with them to be with her husband but ends up taking care of them quite a bit.
we see the brutality of people trying to fend for themselves, and two camps forming in the asylum, the good side and evil side. it becomes a bit of a morality tale of good versus evil and what people can become when there are no laws or they are protected by "the invsibility that comes with blindness" as the movie states.
we don't get a sense of exactly how long they are in this asylum but it appears it is a long time. julianne moore eventually begins to fight back against the evil side (although give the fact she can see, it took her way too long to do this).
just to keep this synopsis shorter, eventually the asylum is abandened and they leave to an outside world that is in disaray, everyone is wondering around like blind zombies, hungry, stealing from each other. there is an element of 28 days later here where the streets are abandoned.
moore directs a small group of people (those she had been taking care of) back to her house which has been untouched.
the movie is drawing to a close, food is found and we see the first man that lost his sight to gain it back leaving us with the hope that others will also regain their site.
all in all, this was a very interesting movie. the colour scheme, production and location were all very beautiful. the film was shot in brazil and the interiors were shot in canada.
i think with some cutting the movie would be even better. danny glover plays one of the "inmates" as well and there is distracting voice over from his character that seems to begin in the middle of the movie for no particular reason.
julianne moore does a nice job of someone dealing with a situation she brought upon herself but can't control. it is a quiet subtle performance that works.
the movie also felt a little like babel or crash, where lives come together and cross paths in an otherwise big city where no one ever talks to each other.
there are a lot of other brutal twists and turns between the good inmates and bad but i'll leave those out of this review. i think this will play well in the art houses, not so much in the wide release but really quite interesting. my friend and i were talking about it the whole way home, which to me is a good sign.
i hope this was useful to you.
joel
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+ Expand All
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zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
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leading roles.Good actor.
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I don't think it was mentioned, but this is based on the novel by Jose Saramago, which is very powerful and which I recommend to all.
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But then even less people would watch it.
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Man, I hate narration. If you, as a filmmaker, have visuals, motion, sound, dialogue, and music but still require a guy point blank telling the audience what's going on, then you are not a good storyteller.
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"See? We told you that you'd all go blind if you kept doing that and...hey, look. You have."
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and my left eye too actually
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Feb 15, 2008 11:14:34 AM CST
A more accurate synopsis... (spoilers same as article)
by aversiontherapy2
As people start to go blind for no reason the government panics and puts all the blind people and all the people who they know have come in contact with them in an old asylum and surround it with soldiers. At first the two sides are blind and not blind (inc the doctor's not blind wife), but everyone in the asylum goes blind and the government is putting more and more people into the building. As it becomes over-crowded and conditions degenerate, that's when a 'evil' side rises up and tries to control the food being given to them each day by the government. Eventually the food stops coming and the the Doctor's wife's group leave to find everyone in the city is blind.
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node is right, this book is brutal. kind of like mccarthy, you have to accept the narrative as being bewildering and unusual, but it is exquisite.
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Last movie of his I saw was Dark Water (ugh). Good to hear Meirelles is keeping up the good work. Hope he doesn't do that Jack Ryan movie.
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The Book by Saramago is a very sufocating tale of sorrow and suspense. And the movie, so far, seems to be very well adapted.
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I think he did a segment for Paris, je t'aime as well. Just hope he stays away from Hollywood. Doesn't really seem like his kinda scene, judging by the way Dark Water turned out.
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Good book, Good Director, Good Cast and interesting premise. Cant wait.
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...the blind; come on men, some new ideas!
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Kidding. Sounds interesting. I love me that Twilight Zone kind of "What If" stuff.
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Yeah :) I meant to put the parenthesize after the blind group not the not blind group.
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Is also a great book btw. The two make a nice pair :)
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The book goes to some very dark places, and I hope the movie doesn't water any of that down. The sequel, 'Seeing', utilizes some of the same characters and goes in a completely different direction, but is also disturbing in its own way.
Someone should ask Sick Fixx if he's read these. I hear he's extraordinarily literate. -
Fernando Meirelles is in the top 5 working directors today, as far as I'm concerned...
The guy is a genius. -
Let me just echo the observations here that the book was very, very powerful. I am curious to see just how this has been adapted to the screen. The imagery detailed in the novel is grim to say the least.
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Some of my friends went to a test screening of this. Apparently like half the theatre walked out during a gang rape scene.
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I was at the screening. I tried counting people leaving, but was on the far left and a fair ways from the back. So from the front / left, about 15 people walked out. A lot of people were saying they only stayed to fill out the surveys afterward. It's safe to say 10-15% of the audience left.
That said: I think part of it was that people didn't know what they were getting into. I'd read the book, and I invited two people who'd done the same. They both turned me down because they knew it would be too brutal / intense and weren't up for it that night.
I thought the movie was most of the way there. My main problem was that the segment of the film that includes the rape scenes, the part that is genuinely horrifying (and that needs to be), goes on for so long that any redemption that comes after seemed too sudden. A full third of the book takes place after they leave the asylum and builds up to the ending. I wasn't timing it or anything, but it seemed to happen too quickly on film.
So yeah, gut-wrenching to say the least. And the narration isn't great. (It's never clear why his character should be the narrative centre of the story.) I'll be curious to see how much changes between now and release.
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