The newly released film Blindness by Fernando Meirelles (City of God), based on the amazing book by Jose Saramago, is receiving angry reviews from a group who hasn't even seen it. The National Federation of the Blind is slamming the movie, saying that it depicts blind people as "incompetent, filthy, vicious and depraved," and that it enforces the stereotype that blind people are helpless and less than human.
In the film, a mysterious epidemic of blindness hits a city, robbing everyone but Julianne Moore of their eyesight. The blind are then quarantined in an asylum to prevent the spread of the epidemic. Without order, proper medical equipment, or basic human rights, the nasty side of human nature comes out. Unbeknownst to me-at least until the Federation of the Blind brought it to my attention-the insanity, rapes, and murders that occur in the asylum were not due to the complete stripping of human dignity and human rights that the government imposed on these scared, ill, people, but rather to the fact that they were blind. According to the NFB, this movie insults blind people by implying that if you and everyone around you suddenly went blind, chaos would ensue. Instead, they must believe that even if the bulk of the population suddenly lost their sight, everything would be fine. Since blind people have no more troubles than their able-sighted neighbours, it wouldn't make much of a difference anyway. People would probably just continue walking down the street as usual; God forbid anybody so much as stumbles, because that might imply that blind people can't walk.
I'm sorry that we don't all share the NFB's optimistic view of human nature. Call me a cynic, but if a huge percentage of the population suddenly lost their sight, the shit might hit the fan. The fact that the epidemic is one that leads to dark glasses and a guidedog is hardly relevant to the collapse of society in the film. It is the fact that it is contagious, scary, and unexplainable that leads to Lord of the Flies-like behavior.
2008 Woodie Awards
Viewing Comments 1 - 5 of 5
mchesser
Marc Workman
posted 10/09/08 @ 5:50 PM EST
Contrary to the false assertions of the author, the justifications of the
protests were nuanced and multi-faceted. One strand of the argument goes as
follows: 1) the public already has misconceptions about blindness that
negatively affect blind people, and 2) this film's inaccurate portrayal of
what it is like to be blind will only perpetuate these misconceptions. (Continued…)
George Holt
posted 10/14/08 @ 1:55 PM EST
This article is both insulting and incorrect, and should be retracted.
Heather
posted 10/19/08 @ 3:58 PM EST
I would just like to point out that everyone is entitled to their own opinion. Both the NFB and the author of this article. If it makes anyone feel better to make a comment stating their dissatisfaction, maybe you should have written the article yourself. (Continued…)
Dan Lametti
posted 10/19/08 @ 7:23 PM EST
"[the NFB] must believe that even if the bulk of the population suddenly lost their sight, everything would be fine."
The NFB must believe this? Did the author of this piece call up the NFB to ask? From what I can tell the author used one quote from the NFB (lifted from a BBC piece on the same story) as justification to write a 500 word nonsensical rant. (Continued…)
Lametti
posted 10/23/08 @ 6:47 PM EST
"People that read the opinion and arts sections of papers/mags would know that an opinion column like Pop Rhetoric isn't reporting, but arguing one side. (Continued…)
Post a Comment