[infoshare] Fw: more information regarding "Blindness" the movie
- From: "SHARON JOYNER" <darlenjoy@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "NYI-L" <nyi-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 02 Oct 2008 23:40:40 -0500
Please do not give any money to this project.
----- Original Message -----
From: Joyce Carrico
To: hlogan@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Friday, October 03, 2008 11:20 AM
Subject: FW: more information regarding "Blindness" the movie
Hi all,
This movie is playing as of today in local theaters. Please take the time to
read the message below. I have never seen or heard of any movie that portrays
blind people in a more disgusting depraved way. I hope you will speak out
against it.
Thanks.
Joyce
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Answers to Frequently Asked Questions
Regarding the Movie Blindness
Q: What is the premise and plot of the movie Blindness?
A: Blindness is based on a novel of the same name by the Portuguese writer José
Saramago. The premise of the movie is that unnamed residents of an unnamed
city in an unnamed country suddenly and mysteriously go blind. Those who
experience the blindness see only a white glare, so the blindness is sometimes
called the "white sickness." The blindness is contagious and the government
immediately quarantines the victims in an abandoned and dilapidated mental
asylum, with orders that anyone attempting to leave is to be killed.
The prisoners are given food and supplies, but deliveries are inadequate and
become increasingly irregular. The asylum also becomes filthy because the
blind inmates, as portrayed in the movie, cannot find their way to the bathroom
and simply relieve themselves on the floor or in their own beds. Some of the
inmates die from infection, disease, or are shot by guards when they try to
escape or simply become lost and wander too close to the fence.
The inmates of ward one, led by an ophthalmologist's wife who can still see but
feigns blindness to remain with her husband, fare slightly better than the
rest; the implication is that this is solely because she assists the blind,
portrayed as being unable to do anything for themselves. As food supplies
dwindle, another group of blind inmates, whose leader has acquired a gun and
dubbed himself "the King of Ward Three," begins to terrorize the others. The
armed clique in ward three hordes all the food, extorting money and valuables
from the other inmates and eventually demanding sex with the women from other
wards in exchange for allowing the rest of the inmates to eat. One of the
members of this clique, who was born blind and is not a victim of the white
sickness, knows how to read and write Braille and is given the task of taking
inventory of the valuables stolen from the other inmates.
When the women from ward one go to ward three to exchange sex for food, one of
the women is beaten to death as she is raped. The doctor's wife later kills
the King of Ward Three, but the man who was born blind takes his place as
leader of the armed gang and threatens to avenge the "King" by killing the
doctor's wife. Being blind, however, he is unable to shoot her and she escapes
unharmed. The rest of the inmates finally decide to do battle with the gang in
ward three; just before the showdown, someone sets a pile of bedding alight,
starting a fire that soon engulfs the entire asylum. During the ensuing
confusion, the man who was born blind shoots himself. When the surviving
inmates, including the group led by the doctor's wife, escape the burning
asylum, they discover that no soldiers are standing guard and they are free.
Outside the makeshift prison, everyone has gone blind and the city has
descended into total chaos; no government services or businesses are
functioning and nomadic groups of mostly naked blind people wander through the
streets, squatting in abandoned houses and shops for shelter and taking food
where they can find it-including in rubbish heaps. There is no electricity or
running water, so the streets and buildings of the city are as filthy as the
asylum was. Dogs that people used to keep as pets have gone wild and roam in
packs, feeding on refuse and human corpses. The home of the doctor and his
wife, however, is intact, and their group sets up residence there. The movie
ends just as they regain their sight-as suddenly and mysteriously as they lost
it.
Q: Have you seen the film?
A: Yes. Members of the National Federation of the Blind were permitted to
screen the film. Many other members of the National Federation of the Blind
have read the novel, and according to the filmmakers themselves, the movie is
"true to the book."
Q: How will this film harm blind people?
A: Blind people already suffer from irrational prejudice based on ignorance and
misconceptions about our capabilities and characteristics. This
prejudice-which is based on ignorance and low expectations but is no less
harmful than prejudice based on ethnicity, religion, or sex--is the cause of
the overwhelming majority of problems experienced by blind people, including an
unemployment rate that exceeds 70 percent and the lack of proper education for
blind children. This movie will further entrench myths and misconceptions
about blindness and blind people, thereby contributing to the barriers to equal
participation in society that we face.
Q: What is wrong with the way blind people are portrayed in the film?
A: Blindness falsely depicts blind people as incapable of almost everything.
Even accepting that most of the characters are newly blind and thus have not
learned certain skills needed to function effectively as a blind person, their
complete and utter incompetence is simply not credible to anyone who has had
even casual contact with actual blind people. The blind people in the film are
unable to dress or bathe themselves; they usually go about naked or nearly
naked and relieve themselves on the floor or in their own beds. The doctor's
wife is shown helping him dress by holding his pants so that he can step into
them, and he comments at one point that she even has to clean him after he has
defecated.
In reality, even newly blinded individuals do not experience this level of
incapacity; they do not forget how to dress, wash, or use the toilet. The
blind people in the movie are portrayed as perpetually disoriented and having
no sense of direction or ability to remember the route from one place to
another. However, blind people regularly travel independently using white canes
or guide dogs. The blind people who are not completely helpless in the novel
and movie are depraved monsters, withholding food from the others in exchange
for money, jewelry, and sex. One of the worst of these criminals is a man who
was born blind and has adapted to his blindness, yet he sides with the criminal
gang of ward three, participating in brutal rapes and attempting to kill
inmates from the other wards. Thus, all of the blind people in the film are
portrayed either as helpless invalids or degenerate criminals. The movie
suggests that blindness completely alters the human personality, resulting
either in total incapacity or villainous evil.
The movie also makes it clear that blindness is cause for complete and
irreversible despair; one blind man comments, "I'd rather die than stay like
this." Blind people, in fact, do live happy lives once they have learned to
accept their blindness and adjust to it. The movie also suggests that the
blind must always defer to the sighted; when the doctor's wife leaves him
outside a supermarket so she can attempt to find food, he says, "I know my
place." The dignity, worth, and individuality of blind people is constantly
denigrated in this way throughout the movie.
The National Federation of the Blind objects to this portrayal of the blind
because it simply isn't accurate. Blind people are a cross-section of society
who happen to share the physical characteristic of being unable to see. The
blind are employed in almost every profession imaginable, have homes and
families, raise children, do volunteer work in their communities, and generally
lead normal, productive lives. To the extent this is not the case, the problem
is not blindness itself, but rather the misconceptions and stereotypes that
society holds about blindness and blind people. This film will further those
myths and misconceptions and deepen public prejudice against the blind. Most
members of the public do not know a blind person and may therefore assume that
this portrayal of blindness is accurate and true. It is not, and the
falsehoods in this film will damage the prospects for equal opportunity,
productivity, dignity, and happiness for blind people throughout the world.
Q: Isn't this just a matter of political correctness, or a difference of
opinion with the novelist and filmmakers?
A: No. Everyone is entitled to his or her own opinion, but not his or her own
facts. If an artist were to create a painting called "Elephant," but the
picture in fact represented a giraffe, a camel, or a creature from the artist's
own imagination, then any art critic-or any layman-would point out that the
picture does not, in fact, represent an elephant. The person pointing out the
inconsistency would not be accused of "political correctness" or a "difference
of opinion" with the artist, but would be recognized as having good common
sense. The portrait of blind people in this movie is simply wrong; artistic
license does not permit a writer or a filmmaker to make false assertions about
an entire group of people. The stereotyping of blind people is just as
inappropriate as the stereotyping of African-Americans, women, Hispanics, or
any other group of individuals who share common characteristics.
Q: Isn't blindness being used as a metaphor in the novel and film?
A: Yes, and this is one of the movie's main problems. Blindness is simply the
physical characteristic of being unable to perceive things with the eyes, but
the author and filmmakers want it to be a metaphor for everything that is bad
about human nature. At the very least, blindness in this movie represents lack
of insight or perception; arguably it represents even worse traits, since many
of the blind characters engage in rape, murder, and other forms of criminal
behavior. Blind people, however, are not inherently obtuse or incapable of
discernment. Although we cannot see with our eyes, we are aware of the world
around us through our other senses and through the alternative techniques we
use to learn about our environment, such as traveling with a white cane,
reading and writing Braille, and using technology.
Blindness is no more an appropriate "metaphor" than other physical
characteristics, like hair color or ethnicity. Movies in which all of the
villains have dark skin or a foreign accent are rightly criticized as employing
racial stereotypes. If a movie were to be made in which people's hair suddenly
turned blonde and all of the characters with blonde hair were vapid idiots,
then people with blonde hair would rightly be outraged. In today's society, it
should likewise be unacceptable for blindness to be used as a stand-in for
depravity, incompetence, and lack of understanding.
Q: Doesn't your protest violate the First Amendment rights of the filmmakers?
A: No. The First Amendment protects the production and screening of this film,
but it also protects our right to protest its production and screening and to
tell the public that it portrays blind people in an outrageously false manner.
Q: Have you brought your concerns to the attention of the filmmakers?
A: Yes. We sent letters to officials involved with the production asking to
meet and discuss our concerns but they refused to respond.
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