Blindness

Product Information

This collection (first published in 1978) from the late Portuguese Nobel Prize for Literature-winner Saramago (The Cave) presents some of the author's early work. Here, the literary lion experiments Continue reading » Some drivers have already got out of their cars, prepared to push the stranded vehicle to a spot where it will not hold up the traffic, they beat furiously on the closed windows, the man inside turns his head in their direction, he is clearly shouting something, to judge by the movements of his mouth he appears to be repeating some words, not one word but three, as turns out to be the case when someone finally manages to open the door, I am blind." Tokyo International Film Festival | "BLINDNESS" Press Conference with Director Fernando Meirelles, Actresses Julian Moore, Yoshino Kimura and more!!". The Day of the Triffids, the 1951 John Wyndham novel (and its many adaptations) about societal collapse following widespread blindness Stephen Garrett of Esquire complimented Meirelles' unconventional style: "Meirelles [honors] the material by using elegant, artful camera compositions, beguiling sound design and deft touches of digital effects to accentuate the authenticity of his cataclysmic landscape." Despite the praise, Garrett wrote that Meirelles' talent at portraying real-life injustice in City of God and The Constant Gardener did not suit him for directing the "heightened reality" of Saramago's social commentary. [42]

An allegory of the breakdown of civilisation, Blindness is also the story of those who finally start resisting raw violence and brutal force, and of those who see through the darkness. However, even as the blind spell breaks, and people are regaining their vision, the world is changed forever. Blindness has become a real threat, a terrifying possibility lurking underneath everyday worries. If it can happen once, it can happen again. And who knows when? You may be waiting at a traffic light, and all of a s This fiction's strangeness must accentuate by the Portuguese writer's particular syntax in which the comma is queen. We failed to put up resistance as we should have done when they first came making demands, Of course, we were afraid and fear isn't always a wise counsellor..." This woman is devoted to her husband, so much so, she feigns blindness to be transported to the “holding tank” of the asylum while all others around her are actually afflicted with the condition.Kirk Honeycutt of The Hollywood Reporter described Blindness as "provocative but predictable cinema", startling but failing to surprise. Honeycutt criticized the film's two viewpoints: Julianne Moore's character, the only one who can see, is slow to act against atrocities, and the behavior of Danny Glover's character comes off as "slightly pompous". Honeycutt explained, "This philosophical coolness is what most undermines the emotional response to Meirelles' film. His fictional calculations are all so precise and a tone of deadly seriousness swamps the grim action." [38] Justin Chang of Variety described the film: " Blindness emerges onscreen both overdressed and undermotivated, scrupulously hitting the novel's beats yet barely approximating, so to speak, its vision." Chang thought that Julianne Moore gave a strong performance but did not feel that the film captured the impact of Saramago's novel. [39] Roger Ebert called Blindness "one of the most unpleasant, not to say unendurable, films I've ever seen." [40] A. O. Scott of The New York Times stated that, although it "is not a great film, ... it is, nonetheless, full of examples of what good filmmaking looks like." [41]

Within this collapsing society, however, a little group of seven people begin to work together to regain a modicum of humanity. The leader of this group is the Doctor’s Wife, the only sighted person in the novel, who has accompanied her ophthalmologist husband to the asylum, even though she is not blind. Her eyesight gives her practical and moral advantages. This sighted woman allows Saramago to explore not only the meaning of blindness but also the meaning of vision. She is instrumental in organizing the group, to keep it safe and fed, in addition to providing spiritual lucidity; she never loses her sympathetic feeling or her moral intelligence. Blindness in this regard is associated with the death of the heart and with the loss of concern for other human beings; the sight of the Doctor’s Wife, on the other hand, is associated with compassion and the retention of an innate moral compass. Siegel, Tatiana (2007-06-12). "3 succumb to 'Blindness' at Focus Int'l". The Hollywood Reporter. The Nielsen Company. Archived from the original on 2007-09-30 . Retrieved 2007-06-18. Maury Chaykin as Accountant, [8] who helps the King of Ward 3 bully the members of the other wards. Because he has been blind since birth, the Accountant is much more used to relying on his other senses, which gives him a major advantage over the other prisoners; he assumes control over Ward 3 and the food supplies for the community after the King is murdered.The eye doctor, along with the doctor’s wife, is one of the novel’s protagonists; he examines the first man to suffer from “white blindness” and then loses his own sight shortly thereafter… The Day of the Triffids, the 1951 John Wyndham novel (and its many adaptations) about societal collapse following widespread blindness. Echeverría, Julia (2017). "Moving beyond Latin America: Fernando Meirelles's Blindness and the epidemic of transnational co-productions". Transnational Cinemas. 8 (2): 113–127. doi: 10.1080/20403526.2017.1249072. S2CID 151506780.