The Blind Side - Worthy of an Oscar or a Hallmark Voucher ?

With all the press noise on this movie emanting from the "will-she, won't-she ?" saga of Sandra Bullock's Oscar chances, I needed a reminder that behind her ultimately successful individual performance, there was a movie in there. So, was it actually any good ?

The Blind Side - the true story of NFL's Michael Oher difficult upbringing and Leigh Anne Tuohy's successful intervention therein - has many of the 'hallmarks' of a movie on Lifetime TV. For a start, it's a true story of triumph over adversity - the lifeblood of that channel. Movies with ready-made story lines where the ultimate victory is assured can often produce lazy writing. It's probably why so many of those obscure bio-pics are reduced to daytime pap. The writer doesn't have to focus on plot development, since its already done for them (For example, we know Michael will get his GPA up over 2.5, otherwise he won't get his scholarship - and we would never have heard of him). There must be compensation for this in the writing of the characters, and the performance of the actors.

Whilst Sandra Bullock does a good turn in her role, and Quinton Aaron as Michael was almost as good (not sure why he was ignored by the Academy in the same year Gabourey Sidibe was toasted to the rafters...?) some of the other characters were straight out of a sitcom, never mind a Hallmark movie. The cheeky, wise-cracking young brother, wheeling and dealing with the prospective college coaches, the sympathetic warm-hearted teacher who sees the good in Michael and turns the other cynical teachers around, the feisty, matronly tutor with the hint of a dark background (Kathy Bates reprises her role as Libby Holden in Primary Colors)..? Per-lease...

Ultimately, there is nothing to see here but the two leads. It's a nice movie - with such strong source material it stood every chance of being so. And there are some funny moments, mostly from Tim McGraw's eye-rolling acceptance of his wife's inevitable dominance over family affairs. Only Sandra Bullock, Quinton Aaron, and the higher production values afforded to an Oscar run movie, elevated it beyond channel 140 on my Verizon FIOS box.