Blindness

Blindness(2008) is an adaptation of a 2005 book by Jose Saramago about a society suffering an epidemic of blindness. At first I was un-sure about the film as it wasn't that acclaimed. However, after watching the film I was very surprised by the innovative of the storyline.

A group of people are struck down by blindness but no-one is sure why. These people are put into camps away from the outside world incase of a spread of this disability. However, a women who can actually see sneaks into these camps with her blind husband agreeing to keep her sight a secret. She soon sees the decline of the overcrowded camps as the blind people can't look after themselves and many die of disease or suicide. The outside world soon stops sending help and the people in the camps soon turn to violence and exploitation in a hysteria to try and survive on the limited food supply. The women finally escapes with a small handful of people and her husband to horrifically find that the entire world has succumb to chaos and squalor inflicted by the blindness.

I found this film very clever in the way they portray human beings instincts when they are at their most vulnerable and weakest. The lighting is perfectly created throughout the film. Inside the camp's the lighting is dark, this has been done not to just show the limited light source, but to also make the audience feel the blindness and claustrophobia. When the survivors escape, the lighting outside is bright and over exposed to give the feeling of freedom and the ability to see.

The casting for this film was spot on, Julianne Moore played the 'seeing' women perfectly as the leader, her weak dishevelled character at the beginning of the film was then built up to be a strong, able, saviour in the world of darkness.

The location I think enhanced the films feeling of being lost, trapped and the horrific feeling of claustrophobia. The use of colour such as the grey, dark walls and the untidy, dirty, ruined clothes of the blind people also added to the feeling of lost hope.

Overall, I was very pleased with this film. All the conventions in the film fitted well with its genre to create emotions and feelings. The film lived unto its expectations of what it was about and I wasn't disappointed.