The Blind Side

This is from an LA Times review of a film based on book about a white family who take in a black kid who becomes a football star who is now a tackle with the Baltimore Ravens.

Watching "The Blind Side" is like watching your favorite football team; you'll cheer when things go well, curse when they don't, and be reminded that in football, as in life, it's how you play the game that counts -- though winning doesn't hurt, either.

I'm talking to the jocks here. The rest of you can just bring Kleenex and give in to this quintessentially old-style story that is high on hope, low on cynicism and long on heart. If Frank Capra was still around, director John Lee Hancock might have had to fight him for the job.

Based on the remarkable true story of Baltimore Ravens tackle Michael Oher -- once a homeless black Memphis teenager literally plucked off the road on an icy winter night by a well-heeled white family -- the movie stars Sandra Bullock as Leigh Anne Tuohy. She's a spitfire of a mom, and it's the kind of smart, sassy role Hollywood should have given the actress ages ago.

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Leigh Anne is a force of nature in a Chanel suit, armed with a cellphone and a .22. In the role, Bullock blows in like a tornado, issuing orders in a rapid-fire Southern drawl that defies speed and ruffles more than a few feathers. It's not her fault, she just knows she's right and won't stop until everyone else is on the same page.

And believe me, Bullock makes "join rather than fight" the option you want to take. She nails the character with every click, click, click of her heels and every toss of those perfectly coiffed blond locks. When she stares down a drug dealer while she assures him her Saturday Night Special works just fine on all the other days of the week, you feel like ducking too.

The rest of the clan is made up of husband Sean, played with an easygoing charm by country singer Tim McGraw, teenage daughter Collins (Lily Collins) and young son SJ, with Jae Head pulling off such a perfect mix of Leigh Anne's cockiness and Sean's charisma that you miss him when he's not around.

Michael ends up enrolled in the private Christian school where the Tuohy kids go. His size and agility had caught the coach's eye and he's accepted despite having a grade-point average that barely registers. That fateful freezing night when Leigh Anne takes him home comes soon after, and almost overnight he is being absorbed into the family, which has not only an open heart and an open mind, but a serious obsession with football, Ole Miss in particular.

What happens next is a testament to the unique people that both Leigh Anne and Michael are. As she begins to piece together the depressing back story of his life, he begins to trust that she will be there for him. These are emotional colors not easy to get to, but they happen here in moving ways because of the chemistry between Bullock and Aaron. She infuses the role with empathy, not pity; he brings an aching vulnerability and an innocence that are remarkable for someone with no formal training.

You know going in that this is a success story, but it still is deeply satisfying to see Michael's life unfold. He becomes a decent student in large part thanks to the help of his tutor Miss Sue ( Kathy Bates), another Ole Miss alum. He's a bull on the field and eventually the object of a college ball recruitment drive so extensive that the NCAA investigates. No one can quite believe the Tuohys would take him in with no ulterior motive, particularly after he chooses to go to Ole Miss.

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This is really a remarkable story and I look forward to seeing the movie. I hope it also shows the dynamic of the daughter Collins and Michael too. I posted about the family and Michael back during the NFL draft when Michael was taken in the first round.

Here is the YouTube trailer.