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20
American Carol, An
26
Babylon A.D.
24
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41
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45
Blindness
57
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66
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63
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58
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15
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82
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43
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15
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43
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58
Express, The
49
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57
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36
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54
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72
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28
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57
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55
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35
How to Lose Friends & Alienate People
65
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57
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73
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46
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52
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53
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61
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51
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31
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43
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37
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35
Mirrors
34
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64
Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist
39
Nights in Rodanthe
45
Pride and Glory
58
Quantum of Solace
53
Quarantine
36
Righteous Kill
53
Rocker, The
59
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19
Saw V
57
Secret Life of Bees, The
49
Sex Drive
63
Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2, The
49
Soul Men
36
Space Chimps
35
Star Wars: The Clone Wars
47
Swing Vote
60
Traitor
71
Tropic Thunder
57
Twilight
70
Vicky Cristina Barcelona
56
W.
93
WALL-E
27
Women, The
47
X-Files: I Want to Believe, The
56
Zack and Miri Make a Porno
93
WALL-E
82
Dark Knight, The
73
Kung Fu Panda
72
Ghost Town
71
Tropic Thunder
70
Vicky Cristina Barcelona
66
Bolt
65
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
64
Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist
63
Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2, The
63
Burn After Reading
61
Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa
60
Traitor
59
Role Models
58
Express, The
58
Quantum of Solace
58
City of Ember
57
Secret Life of Bees, The
57
Body of Lies
57
Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D
57
High School Musical 3: Senior Year
57
Twilight
57
Flash of Genius
56
W.
56
Zack and Miri Make a Porno
55
House Bunny, The
54
Get Smart
53
Quarantine
53
Rocker, The
53
Lucky Ones, The
52
Longshots, The
51
Mamma Mia!
49
Sex Drive
49
Family That Preys, The
49
Soul Men
47
Swing Vote
47
X-Files: I Want to Believe, The
46
Lakeview Terrace
45
Blindness
45
Pride and Glory
43
Eagle Eye
43
Meet Dave
43
Death Race
41
Beverly Hills Chihuahua
39
Nights in Rodanthe
37
Miracle at St. Anna
36
Space Chimps
36
Righteous Kill
36
Fly Me to the Moon
35
How to Lose Friends & Alienate People
35
Star Wars: The Clone Wars
35
Mirrors
34
My Best Friend's Girl
31
Max Payne
28
Haunting of Molly Hartley. The
27
Women, The
26
Babylon A.D.
24
Bangkok Dangerous
20
American Carol, An
19
Saw V
15
Disaster Movie
15
College
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

xx
All of Us
53
Allah Made Me Funny: Live in Concert
57
Amazing Truth About Queen Raquela, The
64
Appaloosa
69
Ashes of Time Redux
68
August Evening
xx
B.O.H.I.C.A.
62
Baghead
84
Ballast
54
Battle in Seattle
xx
Beer for My Horses
75
Betrayal - Nerakhoon, The
xx
Billy: The Early Years
66
Boogie Man: The Lee Atwater Story
56
Bottle Shock
55
Boy in the Striped Pajamas, The
50
Breakfast with Scot
61
Brick Lane
43
Call and Response
62
Changeling
49
Children of Huang Shi, The
47
Choke
46
Choose Connor
84
Christmas Tale, A
41
Cthulhu
81
Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father
xx
Dostana
62
Duchess, The
44
Dukes, The
63
Eden
xx
Eden Lake
66
Elegy
46
Elephant King, The
80
Encounters at the End of the World
26
Everybody Wants to Be Italian
64
Fall, The
69
Fear(s) of the Dark
26
Filth and Wisdom
28
Fireproof
52
First Basket, The
67
Flow: For Love of Water
37
Forever Strong
69
Frontrunners
82
Frozen River
43
Gardens of the Night
73
Girl Cut in Two, A
73
Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson
54
Good Dick
30
Guitar, The
84
Happy-Go-Lucky
44
Henry Poole is Here
31
Hounddog
27
House of the Sleeping Beauties
47
How About You
54
Humboldt County
72
I Served the King of England
70
I.O.U.S. A
40
Igor
64
In Search of a Midnight Kiss
78
I've Loved You So Long
63
JCVD
41
Johnny Got His Gun
xx
Just Buried
62
Kabluey
63
Kit Kittredge: An American Girl
27
Lake City
78
Last Mistress, The
81
Let the Right One In
xx
Lower Learning
63
Man Named Pearl, A
89
Man on Wire
xx
Mary
xx
Matador, The
62
Mister Foe
84
Momma's Man
51
Morning Light
79
Moving Midway
33
My Name Is Bruce
59
Nights and Weekends
73
Obscene
40
Other End of the Line, The
34
Otto; or Up with Dead People
40
Passengers
xx
Phoebe in Wonderland
55
Ping Pong Playa
75
Pool, The
77
Pray the Devil Back to Hell
82
Rachel Getting Married
56
Religulous
32
Repo! The Genetic Opera
xx
Roadside Romeo
53
RocknRolla
56
Save Me
74
Secret, A
45
Shoot on Sight
57
Sixty Six
84
Slumdog Millionaire
52
Special
58
Splinter
79
Stranded: I Have Come from a Plane That Crashed on the Mountains
67
Synecdoche, New York
82
Tell No One
64
Thousand Years of Good Prayers, A
57
Towelhead
72
Transsiberian
83
Trouble the Water
43
Tru Loved
83
U2 3D
61
Universe of Keith Haring
84
Up the Yangtze
52
Virtual JFK: Vietnam If Kennedy Had Lived
79
Visitor, The
61
Wackness, The
59
We Are Wizards
55
What Just Happened?
66
When Did You Last See Your Father?
89
Man on Wire
84
Slumdog Millionaire
84
Christmas Tale, A
84
Up the Yangtze
84
Ballast
84
Momma's Man
84
Happy-Go-Lucky
83
Trouble the Water
83
U2 3D
82
Tell No One
82
Frozen River
82
Rachel Getting Married
81
Let the Right One In
81
Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father
80
Encounters at the End of the World
79
Stranded: I Have Come from a Plane That Crashed on the Mountains
79
Moving Midway
79
Visitor, The
78
I've Loved You So Long
78
Last Mistress, The
77
Pray the Devil Back to Hell
75
Pool, The
75
Betrayal - Nerakhoon, The
74
Secret, A
73
Girl Cut in Two, A
73
Obscene
73
Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson
72
Transsiberian
72
I Served the King of England
70
I.O.U.S. A
69
Ashes of Time Redux
69
Frontrunners
69
Fear(s) of the Dark
68
August Evening
67
Synecdoche, New York
67
Flow: For Love of Water
66
Boogie Man: The Lee Atwater Story
66
Elegy
66
When Did You Last See Your Father?
64
Thousand Years of Good Prayers, A
64
Fall, The
64
Appaloosa
64
In Search of a Midnight Kiss
63
JCVD
63
Eden
63
Man Named Pearl, A
63
Kit Kittredge: An American Girl
62
Changeling
62
Kabluey
62
Duchess, The
62
Mister Foe
62
Baghead
61
Wackness, The
61
Brick Lane
61
Universe of Keith Haring
59
Nights and Weekends
59
We Are Wizards
58
Splinter
57
Towelhead
57
Amazing Truth About Queen Raquela, The
57
Sixty Six
56
Save Me
56
Religulous
56
Bottle Shock
55
Boy in the Striped Pajamas, The
55
What Just Happened?
55
Ping Pong Playa
54
Humboldt County
54
Battle in Seattle
54
Good Dick
53
RocknRolla
53
Allah Made Me Funny: Live in Concert
52
First Basket, The
52
Virtual JFK: Vietnam If Kennedy Had Lived
52
Special
51
Morning Light
50
Breakfast with Scot
49
Children of Huang Shi, The
47
How About You
47
Choke
46
Choose Connor
46
Elephant King, The
45
Shoot on Sight
44
Henry Poole is Here
44
Dukes, The
43
Call and Response
43
Tru Loved
43
Gardens of the Night
41
Johnny Got His Gun
41
Cthulhu
40
Igor
40
Other End of the Line, The
40
Passengers
37
Forever Strong
34
Otto; or Up with Dead People
33
My Name Is Bruce
32
Repo! The Genetic Opera
31
Hounddog
30
Guitar, The
28
Fireproof
27
House of the Sleeping Beauties
27
Lake City
26
Everybody Wants to Be Italian
26
Filth and Wisdom
xx
Dostana
xx
Phoebe in Wonderland
xx
All of Us
xx
Matador, The
xx
Billy: The Early Years
xx
Roadside Romeo
xx
B.O.H.I.C.A.
xx
Eden Lake
xx
Just Buried
xx
Beer for My Horses
xx
Mary
xx
Lower Learning
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
|
Blindness
Miramax Films
 |
|
MPAA RATING: R for violence including sexual assaults, language and sexuality/nudity.
Starring
Mark Ruffalo,
Julianne Moore,
Gael Garcia Bernal,
Sandra Oh,
and
Danny Glover
It begins in a flash, as one man is instantaneously struck blind while driving home from work, his whole world suddenly turned to an eerie, milky haze. One by one, each person he encounters – his wife, his doctor, even the seemingly good Samaritan who gives him a lift home – will in due course suffer the same unsettling fate. As the contagion spreads, and panic and paranoia set in across the city, newly blind victims of the “White Sickness” are rounded up and quarantined within a crumbling, abandoned mental asylum, where all semblance of ordinary life begins to break down. (Miramax Films)
| GENRE(S): |
Drama
|
Mystery
|
Romance
|
Suspense/Thriller
|
| WRITTEN BY: |
Don McKellar
|
| DIRECTED BY: |
Fernando Meirelles
|
| RELEASE DATE: |
Theatrical: October 3, 2008
|
| RUNNING TIME: |
120 minutes, Color |
| ORIGIN: |
Canada | Brazil | Japan |
| LANGUAGE(S): |
English | Japanese |

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
83
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Bill White
Meirelles adds another perspective, that the epidemic might be a good thing if, by being thrown into the darkness together, we may once again recognize the human family to which we all belong.

78
Austin Chronicle
Kimberley Jones
It's a rattling, heartrending performance (Moore) in, yes, a long, hard slough of a film – one that is well worth the journey, if not a repeat trip.

75
ReelViews
James Berardinelli
It engaged me throughout and I found the ending to be surprisingly hopeful.

75
San Francisco Chronicle
Mick LaSalle
At times almost unbearably ugly, but by the time you walk out of the theater, you know you've seen something.

75
Portland Oregonian
Stan Hall
Visually nervy, beautifully acted, intense and philosophically compelling, it struggles to connect emotionally as it wrestles with the challenging source material.

75
Boston Globe
Wesley Morris
A perversely enjoyable, occasionally harrowing adaptation of José Saramago's 1995 disaster allegory.

63
New York Post
Kyle Smith
I kept hoping the meaning would click into place, but it never quite did.

63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Liam Lacey
It's more like a filmed allegory.

60
Empire
Staff (Not credited)
Handicapped by pretensions to making big statements, Blindness is still gripping, disturbing and intermittently powerful.

60
NPR
Bob Mondello
Moore is always watchable, Ruffalo and Bernal get a nice rivalry going without ever establishing eye contact (as it were), and Danny Glover has some nice moments in an underdeveloped part as an older man who finds, to his benefit, that love is blind.

58
Entertainment Weekly
Lisa Schwarzbaum
As the players enact the fall and rebirth of civilization, Meirelles suggests that even a society gone to hell looks better with a little music-video-like pizzazz.

58
The Onion (A.V. Club)
Scott Tobias
There's a good movie here, but we get it in pieces that are sometimes hard to decipher.

50
USA Today
Claudia Puig
A brilliant idea that seems to lack the vision to be great.

50
Washington Post
Neely Tucker
An arresting, often riveting film that is fascinating to look at but not nearly so interesting to watch.

50
The New York Times
A.O. Scott
Not a great film, mainly because it can't transcend -- and, indeed, lays bare -- the intellectual flimsiness of its source. But it is, nonetheless, full of examples of what good filmmaking looks like. For all its chin-rubbing, brow-furrowing attitudes, it does not, in the end, give you much to think about. But there is, nonetheless, a lot here to see.

50
The Hollywood Reporter
Kirk Honeycutt
Blindness is provocative cinema. But it also is predictable cinema: It startles but does not surprise.

50
Variety
Justin Chang
Meirelles' slickly crafted drama rarely achieves the visceral force, tragic scope and human resonance of Saramago's prose.

50
Philadelphia Inquirer
Steven Rea
Murky and grainy, and showing human beings at their grimmest - thievery, rape, betrayal, murder - Blindness is no barrel of laughs. But it IS a barrel of pretentious metaphorical musings.

50
Chicago Tribune
Michael Phillips
This film is very different: chilly, methodical, a slave to 10-ton metaphor as opposed to metaphoric provocation.

50
Miami Herald
Connie Ogle
For all its pretension and artiness, Blindness is more like M. Night Shyamalan's "The Happening" (which at least had the decency to be fast-paced and short), right down to its upbeat and inane conclusion.

50
Baltimore Sun
Chris Kaltenbach
You get the film's message, that mankind does not react well when challenged by unpleasantness it can't explain away, within the first 15 minutes -- leaving more than 100 minutes to ponderously belabor the point.

40
The New Yorker
Anthony Lane
The trouble with Blindness is that it’s so preoccupied with shouldering this symbolic weight that it gradually forgets to tell a story--to keep faith with the directives of common sense.

40
Village Voice
Anthony Kaufman
Unflinching at best and treacly at worst, the film unveils its apocalyptic scenario with visceral intensity, but lacks the emotional sophistication to rise above schadenfreude kicks.

40
Salon.com
Stephanie Zacharek
An extended metaphor for the condition of man, and boy is it extended. In the course of two hours that crawl by like four and a half.

38
Chicago Sun-Times
Roger Ebert
Blindness is one of the most unpleasant, not to say unendurable, films I've ever seen.

38
Charlotte Observer
Lawrence Toppman
A feel-nothing movie – a series of disconnected, implausible incidents that end as arbitrarily as they began, in an effort to inspire emotions the picture never justifies.

30
Los Angeles Times
Carina Chocano
What was presumably intended to play like a fable plays, instead, like an overly long car commercial crossed with a scare-mongering public service announcement.

25
Christian Science Monitor
Peter Rainer
After a powerful opening, when we see the first victim suddenly go blind while driving in traffic, the film devolves into a dystopian freak show and wastes many wonderful performers, including Mark Ruffalo and Julianne Moore.

20
New York Daily News
Staff (Not credited)
Piles on the indignities, violence and island-of-man turmoil.

10
Film Threat
Matthew Sorrento
The able cast can't swim through the muck.

0
Chicago Reader
J.R. Jones
This ends on an uplifting and philosophical note, equating moral blindness with the literal sort, which you'll probably appreciate if you haven't already slit your wrists.


The average user rating for this movie is 6.9 (out of 10) based on 32 User Votes
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