A Heartwarming Film About Overcoming Obstacles with a Helping Hand
This is a sweet movie that suggests all problems are solvable, especially with the right support.
A wealthy woman, driven by genuine compassion, adopts a poor teenager. Encouraged by her support, he goes on to have a successful career in American football. Sixteen-year-old Michael Oher is a huge, awkward, and academically struggling black kid. His IQ is only 80, which is close to being considered “feeble-minded.” He doesn’t want to (or can’t) complete school tests. The only thing the big guy is good at is throwing and catching a ball.
A Chance Encounter
Like a stray kitten, he’s taken in by a kind-hearted white woman (a designer, Christian, and Republican). She gives him a bed on a ten-thousand-dollar couch but still asks her husband before bed, “Do you think he’ll rob us?” “We’ll find out in the morning,” the angelic husband cheerfully replies. The young man turns out to be honest and doesn’t steal anything. Overjoyed, the heroine becomes his guardian, and under the guidance of the gentle white woman, human feelings and intelligence quickly awaken in the thick-skinned boy. He starts calling Bullock’s character “Mom” and writes a thoughtful essay on Tennyson’s poem “The Charge of the Light Brigade.”
The Power of Goodness
The film resonates with the line from a Soviet song: “Remember how many good people there are!” It’s a story of militant optimism and the absolute triumph of goodwill over social ills. For those who find the plot fantastical, the end credits hit you with photos of the real-life people the movie is based on: the “hippo” is now 24 and a star in American football.
A Dose of Optimism
“The Blind Side” is less of a movie and more of a sermon with a simultaneous injection of antidepressants. The dosage and composition are precisely calculated for the American audience. In the U.S. (“a beautiful, dreamy, trusting country,” as another child adopter, Humbert Humbert, wrote), the film grossed a quarter of a billion dollars. In Europe, it made very little. In Russia, it had no chance at all: phrases like “The world is a good place, and we’ll be okay” are immediately rejected there, like obviously inedible Hollywood sugar.