The Blind Side

Being a huge fan of American Football and heavily involved in the game in Britain I was a little surprised with myself that I never managed to see this adaptation of the excellent Michael Lewis book while it was in the cinema. After all, Sandra Bullock won an Oscar and my interest had been perked by the fact that the central character had recently been drafted into the NFL. Perhaps I was worried that in the process of going through Hollywood scriptwriters the story would have become unrecognisable from the original? Whatever the excuse, I only last week did I get around to watching 'The Blind Side'.

Some background on the plot then. Michael Oher is a street kid whose guardian gets him enlisted in a middle class Christian school in Memphis after the school sports coach notices Oher's sporting potential. Oher cannot cope with his surrounds until a local wealthy family - the Tuohys - notice him walking thestreets and give him a home. They nurture Oher's creative, educational and sports-playing side until he gets noticed by the coaches in the big leagues, and is wooed by every university in the southern US states. It's a fuzzy and warm story in which an underdog comes good and rich people are nice and philanthropic. The ideal Holywood yarn.

This is a true story, and one which is portrayed faithfully to the book. Sandra Bullock is ideally cast as Leigh Anne Tuohy, the rich matriarch of a family who have benefitted from everything that can work about the American dream but still carry the baggage of a world that will label them rednecks. She's a woman who is used to being able to get what she wants, isn't afraid to tell people some home truths when it suits her, admits to knowing no Democrats and is a card-carrying member of the NRA. Yet despite all the stereotypes, she is the driving force behind Oher's schooling and subsequent enrolment to play football at the University of Mississippi.

The film has no qualms about referring to the controversy that Michael Oher caused when he entered the NCAA system. A large black kid was plucked off the streets by a wealthy white family who happen to be fanatical fans of their Alma Mater's football team. He also happens to be the nation's hottest prospect at Offensive Tackle and - surprise surprise - ends up playing for exactly whom his rich benefactors support. No shock then that his case was investigated in detail by the NCAA. The film stays true to the book's portrayal of events, and shows the Tuohys as rich do-gooders who accidentally stumbled across a kid of extra-ordinary talent whom they nurtured. For me though, I find their story to be ever so slightly convenient. Although the book and film both imply that the Tuohys had no prior knowledge of Oher's sporting potential when they first offered him a bed for the night, it is only the word of Leigh Anne Tuohy whom we have to believe on the matter. Who is to say what the true course of events were?

This is a film that I enjoyed hugely. Firstly for Sandra Bullock’s excellent performance and secondly because it's a film that showcases just how passionate many in the southern US states are about American Football. All of this is done without ramming Gridiron down the audience's throat. Save for a brief introduction at the start of the film, there isn't any American Football until we're almost an hour in. It's a story that anyone should be able to enjoy regardless of what they think of a sport that many in Britain see as a poor man's Rugby League.