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Director Fernando Meirelles went a bit overboard with this one

Glover is compelling when on-screen, as is most of the multi-ethnic cast. Moore is appropriately wan as the lone witness to the indignities, while Ruffalo studiously does what he can with his character's confusing development. Gael García Bernal is oddly charismatic as the opportunistic (and ultimately evil) bartender who takes control of the sanitarium's food supply and plunges the community into violence. But no amount of acting skill can compensate for an underdeveloped storyline that forces characters to act and speak in ways that are not convincingly justified by the story.

For most of its 120 minutes, Blindness assaults its audience with a relentlessly bleak vision of humanity. A protracted scene of gang rape is (cleverly) more graphic aurally than visually, but is, in this reviewer's estimation, intolerable. The director seems to relish the horrific, as when the camera repeatedly lingers on dogs eating a human corpse. Undoubtedly there is a place in filmmaking for unflinching portrayals of mankind's depravity and the brutal realities of the world. In the case of Blindness, however, the viewer is asked too suffer too much and receive too little. (And pay for the privilege.)

No doubt every reviewer who sees Blindness (produced, ironically, by Focus Films) will dig deep for his or her own special vision-related play on words. Here is mine: Blindness is a film I wish I hadn't seen.

Talk About It

1. In the movie, the response by health officials to the blindness epidemic seems brutally callous. How do you think your city officials would respond to the outbreak of a highly contagious disease? How would you respond?
2. Blindness seems to suggest that many individuals will act in selfish and potentially criminal ways when freed from societal restraints. Is this your understanding of human nature? Is this consistent with the biblical view that all humans are fallen? (Romans 3:23) How about with the view that each person is made in the image of God? (Genesis 1:26)
3. Ultimately the doctor's wife and the receptionist had to take some human lives to save others. Were their actions justified? Why or why not? Should they have acted sooner? Why or why not?
4. Is there "blindness" within your community to certain individuals or needs? What is the appropriate response?
5. How would you evaluate the director's handling of the rape scene in Blindness? Was it necessary to the story, or gratuitous? How does a Christian viewer evaluate the difference between truthful storytelling and graphic-for-entertainment's-sake sexual violence?

The Family Corner

Blindness is rated R for violence including sexual assaults, language and sexuality/nudity. Take this rating seriously. While a lengthy gang rape scene is explicit more through dialogue than visual elements, there are also numerous graphic portrayals of consensual sexual activity and nudity.

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