Blindness
![Watch film Blindness — Blindness - Official® Trailer [HD]](https://www.acmodasi.in/amdb/images/posters/0/83/blindness-2008-QHu0o.webp)
Short description
An unexplained epidemic of blindness spreads through an unnamed city. Those affected see only a bright white blankness rather than darkness. The authorities quarantine the first victims in a disused hospital or asylum, where they receive little help and conditions deteriorate as more people arrive. One woman, the wife of an eye doctor, retains her sight for reasons that are never explained, and she keeps this secret so she can stay with her husband. Inside the overcrowded ward, order collapses and the stronger inmates prey on the weaker. The film is based on the Portuguese novelist José Saramago's novel about a mass outbreak of sightlessness.
Fernando Meirelles directed, working from a screenplay by Don McKellar. It followed City of God and The Constant Gardener in Meirelles's filmography, and Julianne Moore plays the doctor's wife, with Mark Ruffalo as the doctor, Danny Glover as a man with a black eye patch, and Gael García Bernal among the inmates. The production was an international one, spanning Brazil, the United Kingdom, Italy, Canada, the United States and Japan.
Made for about 25 million US dollars, the film took roughly 20 million worldwide, less than its budget. On IMDb it holds 6.5 out of 10 from around 77,000 votes, and on TMDB 6.5 from about 1,400; a critics' rating of 5.6 from 159 reviews places it below those audience scores. Its large credited cast and crew reflect the scale of the production.
What's left behind the scenes
- Initially, Daniel Craig was supposed to play the main male role. However, due to his commitments to other projects, the role went to Mark Ruffalo.
- The film is based on a novel by the Portuguese writer and Nobel laureate, José Saramago. The book was published in Portuguese in 1995, and then two years later it was translated into English and published under the title “Blindness” in the United States.
- Initially, the author of the book was very wary of selling the rights to it and the possibility of a film adaptation. Fernando Meirelles himself was also rejected. The ice was broken when producer Niv Fichman and future screenwriter Don McKellar visited José Saramago at his home in the Canary Islands in 1999. A mandatory condition from the writer was that the action in the film should not be tied to any real existing country.
- The author of the book, José Saramago, very much wanted to see the premiere of the film at the Cannes Film Festival. His doctors did not allow him to travel due to his health, and in response, the director himself flew to Lisbon to show the film to the writer.
- Director Fernando Meirelles initially planned to shoot the film in Portuguese, but then abandoned this idea, believing that it would initially significantly limit his audience.
- Approximately 700 extras were involved in the film's production and were specifically trained to portray blindness. Christian Vuurvoort, who appeared in the director's previous film "City of God" (2002), and Barbara Christine Sweet served as special trainers for this aspect.
- The film provoked a strongly negative reaction from the American Foundation for the Blind and other organizations representing the interests of the blind and visually impaired. In a press release issued before the premiere, Dr. Marc Maurer, Chairman of the American Foundation for the Blind, stated that the film and the book depict blind people in a negative light in the United States and around the world. Protests were planned and held in many states immediately before the film's premiere.
- Around the 40th minute of the film, during a scene about a widespread epidemic, crashing planes, and chaos in the transportation system, a fragment of black-and-white CCTV footage from the Lefortovo Tunnel in Moscow is shown.
- The film is based on José Saramago's novel "Blindness" (Ensaio sobre a cegueira, 1997).
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