How Does ‘The Blind Side’ Look in Light of Michael Oher’s Lawsuit? Even More Fake Than It Did Before
17.08.2023 - 00:29
/ variety.com
Owen Gleiberman Chief Film Critic It’s a clockwork ritual of awards season. A movie in contention, one based on a true story, will be dinged for presenting a version of reality that isn’t real enough.
The critical chatter often starts on Twitter, but it can come from anywhere, ultimately spreading to the mainstream media (by the time there’s a New York Times editorial, you know the controversy has reached full tempest-in-a-teapot boil). We’ve seen this happen with dramas as disparate as “A Beautiful Mind” and “Green Book” and “Mank.” The original source of the attack can often be a rival studio, out to damage an awards competitor (a tactic that was turned into a kind of bloodsport by Harvey Weinstein).
Yet it’s a curious thing: By the time the Oscars have come and gone, the criticisms tend to roll right off the movie in question. It’s as if, awards season aside, they never mattered all that much in the first place.
Yet I’m not sure that’s going to happen with “The Blind Side.” In recent days, the true story behind the popular 2009 drama, for which Sandra Bullock won the Oscar for best actress, has made headlines, and the headlines have not been pretty. The film, set in 2004, told the story of how Michael Oher, as a lost soul of 17, was taken in by Leigh Anne and Sean Tuohy (played in the movie by Bullock and Tim McGraw), a prosperous Memphis couple who gave the disconsolate Black teenager a home, made him part of their family, became his legal guardians, and steered him toward becoming a successful high school offensive tackle.
He ultimately made it into the NFL, which gave the story a very Hollywood ending. But now Oher has filed a petition against the Tuohys, alleging that he was never legally adopted by them; that
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