Month: February 2010

Thoughts on “The Blind Side”

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Let me ask you some questions:

1) Did you know that poor people have crappy lives?
2) Did you know that black people and white people have some cultural differences?
3) Did you know that being nice is good?

If you said “no” to any of these questions, then listen up you backwater gimp, because have I got a movie for you!

I mocked The Blind Side in an earlier post, but I feel the need to expound. The Blind Side is about a family of Clampetts (money included) who learn all 3 of the above things over the course of 2 hours (I think it was two hours; it felt like nine weeks.)

Sandra Bullock is the favorite for Best Actress, and make no mistake, she’s clearly memorized all of her lines in this film. She’ll win the Oscar because she doesn’t smile a lot in the movie (‘cuz she don’t take no guff!) and she makes money for studios without being all bitchy, so naturally the Academy will honor her as one of our leading artistic vanguards.

In the movie, S-Bull plays some sassy, brassy, Southerny loudmouth, which is the #1 Sign That My Wife Will Like The Movie. Be it Kyra Sedgwick as The Closer on TNT, or Mo’Nique as Lifetime Achievement SassMonster in Phat Girlz, my wife will automatically love you and find no fault with your performance if you’re a sassy boombalassy. My wife characterizes Sandra Bullock’s performance in this as “Great.” When she said this, I nodded politely and walked out of the room so I could cry.

Tim McGraw plays her husband, who’s also a redneck twit. My favorite moment of the movie is when Sandy B suggests that The Golden Child go see a child psychologist, what with the murder and the crackwhore mom and all that icky stuff. McGraw says, “What? He was in the projects, and now he’s gonna lie on a couch like he’s WOODY ALLEN OR SOMETHIN’?” I was hoping he’d turn to the camera and say, “TAKE THAT, JEWWWWW!” Live like you were brain-dead, ya’ll.

Also featured in the movie are Bullock’s obnoxious rich friends, who may be the most embarrassing representation of Southerners in film history, and yes, I’m remembering Birth of a Nation. They’re big-eyed obnoxious twats, and I hated them. They’re so befuddled by the amazing fact that Bullock’s character knows a black dude that I half-expected them to ask why come coloreds smelled diffurnt.

But my prior gripes all pale in comparison to the worst aspect of the film (and I’m not even mentioning the WACKY little white kid that hangs out with the big black kid and they both learn how to be, gasp, PEOPLE!). The worst thing about The Blind Side is that it’s one of the most boring films I’ve ever seen. This won’t ever be brought up, because people that love this movie prefer having their values affirmed over honestly critiquing art, but this is one of the dullest things I’ve seen in a long time. For a film about a football player, there are maybe 15 minutes’ worth of football stuff in the whole movie. The rest of the movie plays like this:

Big Mute Black Kid With Eight Lines In The Whole Movie: “I want a driver’s license.”
Bullock: “WELL DING-DANGIN’ WHY COME DERR?”
BMBKWELITWM: “So I can have something to call my own.”
Bullock: “DERRRRRR”

(stares off into space, music swells, everybody learns)

I think the above scene happens 45 times during The Blind Side.

Even worse, as a University of Tennessee fan, I despised it even more. Bullock’s character hates Tennessee football, and BMBKWELITM thinks that he may want to go to UT. This leads to a series of embarrassing scenes featuring Phil Fulmer, who has the face and demeanor of a drunken trout. Making it 100x worse, ED FUCKING ORGERON shows up as coach of Ole Miss, and inspires BMBKWELITM into going to the family alma mater. It’s so heart-warming you’ll want to punch a kitten.

The Blind Side is a big bowl of pander stew. It’s one of those movies that inspires idiots to think about stuff they should have already figured out. Who wants to watch adult idiots finally grow up?

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“Avatar”

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If you’ve never seen a movie before, I highly recommend seeing “Avatar.” Every line of crap dialogue will feel fresh and new, and you won’t be able to see every single twist in the story within 10 minutes of the movie starting.

Sam Worthington is terrible. He plays a shitty Australian actor that can never quite figure out how to do an American accent. He’s dressed as a Marine. Stephen Lang plays Col. Hap Hapablap. Sigourney Weaver smokes, and there’s also tons of computer graphics. Supposedly, this was going to be the film that made us forget we were staring at pixels, because it’s all so photoreal. As James Cameron liked to say, “We pushed the technology envelope on this film . . . and it pushed back!” Apparently, the technology pushed them down the stairs, because most of this film looks like the most awesome video game cut scene ever.

I’m not denying Cameron’s talent: The man can put together a technically amazing film, and I like that his films are coherent. (On a side note, I hate Michael Bay.)
Unfortunately, because they’re coherent, I’m able to clearly realize that I’m watching something sucky.

The reason Cameron’s made the two highest grossing movies ever is simple: They aren’t that great, but by God, you want to see them. His films are shiny pander-thons, boomy and splody with a couple of kissy parts. He’s found the perfect middle ground between super-shiny stuff and lazy, boring dialogue. People don’t have to listen to Cameron’s films; they can just stare, and occasionally, something will catch their eye and they can go “heh” or “huh,” then it’s over and they don’t think about them again. Quite simply, it’s the kind of popular entertainment our world craves, and it’s cheaper than buying a fishtank.

It WAS shiny, though. So whoopdee-doo.