the movie "Blindness"

[riotheclown]

I watched Blindness on Bravo last night.

Producer Niv Fichman became interested in the project back in 1999 when he and Don McKellar, who would write the script, flew to the Canary Islands to talk to the Nobel Prize-winning Portuguese author José Saramago about giving them the film rights to his book. One of Saramago's conditions was that the film must not be set in any recognizable countries.

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First of all, I read the book because, when I walked into a second hand book store the owner said, "If you buy this book and do not think it is the most incredible book ever, I will give you double your money back." 

I read it and then each of my kids read it.  It is certainly, one of the most powerful books ever written.  With a very simple premise it tears open the nest of human tendencies, good and bad and lays them all bare. 

There is only one woman who can see and she sees everything. Jullianna Moore plays this woman.  She is such a gifted actress.  Every time I see a movie with her in it I am surprised she is so generous in her willingness to be vulernable and even ugly, so not Hollywood. 

There are great performances all over the place, the choices made in the adaptation are good.  If you take the time to read the book or watch the movie will be worth it.

If it received less that top marks it must be for the fact that it in no way glorifies violence or rape.  I am so tired of the way television and movies glam up physical abuse and rape when they are pretending to abhor both.  It also does not have the Roman/American Hero, but it has small acts of heroism, many of them, numerous questions about "self" image, about relationships and survival and the value of life and love.

I love that it shows and avoids telling... There is a scene (not a major spoiler) where she sees a pack of dogs devouring a body and then a goofy looking dog comes up and licks her face.  She hugs the dog.  It is in this contrast, that the whole story pivots.  In Zen  the study of Kohan often starts with "Mu".  Question: "Does a dog have Buddha nature?" Answer: "Mu"  Discussion: A dog is a dog.  By it's nature a dog cannot be Buddha, however, everything is Buddha, there is no separation between self and other, only when realize ourselves to be Buddha are we and the world, whole. 

This movie, like the book is going to follow me for days.

It was not, in the end depressing, not at all.  There is an aspect of humanity that is loathsome. (too much of anything is loathsome) But the thing about being human is we do see and it is not about the eyes it is about the mind and the heart. In the face of so much horror we open and reopen to beauty and love and forgiveness.