The Blind Side free essay sample

With no real special effects to speak of, the design team had to rely on the basics such as lighting, camera angle, costumes, and props to recreate the events and capture the feel of the story. A look into the scene where Michael is first approached by Leigh Anne Tuohy and invited into their home will give a good indication whether or not they were able to accomplish their task. The responsibility of creating a quality motion picture lies with the members of the design team. Individually and collectively the director, production designer, art director, and cinematographer must combine their knowledge and creative abilities to create a great movie. Each of these areas is vital to creating a great movie that will capture the viewers’ attention and make the movie an enjoyable occasion for them. In a movie like The Blind Side where the movie is more of a character study and the events are true the design team faces some challenges. We will write a custom essay sample on The Blind Side or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page They have to work without the benefit of special effects to keep the audience interested while depicting an accurate portrayal of the facts and the characters. All movies really start the production process with a vision from the director when they read a script. With The Blind Side the story was originally written and released as a book by Michael Lewis in 2006, then was adapted for screenplay and directed by John Lee Hancock in (2009). The story involves Michael and the entire Tuohy family including Sean, Leigh Anne, teenage daughter Collins, and son Sean â€Å"S. J. † Junior. However it seems that Hancock has put the main focus on the relationship between Michael and Leigh Anne throughout the movie just as in the scene Do You Have Any Place to Stay? Hancock says â€Å"It really is two different stories, one of which is more of a question: Who is Michael Oher and why did the stars align to shine so brightly on this kid from the projects in Memphis? And then on the other side, it’s a great story about how this unique family evolved, and the unconventional mother son relationship at its center. (The Blind Side Full Production Notes www. madeinatlantis. com ) Hancock must ensure that every element is in place to scenes captured on film are as he envisioned them. The production designer has a long list of duties that begin early in production. The production designer first must collaborate with the director and cinematographer to establish the visual feel and specific needs of the project. The production designer also directs key staff members in other departments such as the costume designer, the key hair and make-up stylists, the special effects director and the locations manager. In The Blind Side in designing the sets, Production Designer Michael Corenblith says he wanted to emphasize the disparity between East Memphis, where wealthy families like the Tuohys live, and the poverty of Hurt Village, where Michael grew up on the other side of town. The Blind Side Full Production Notes www. madeinatlantis. com) After filming sites have been determined the art director must begin their work. The art director reports to the production designer, and more directly oversees artists and craftspeople, such as the set designers, graphic artists, and illustrators who give form to the production design as it develops. In the Blind Si de Art Director Thomas Minton and Production designer Michael Corenblith worked closely together in designing the sets. Since this was a true story they really wanted the audience to relate to the story and identify with the settings. It was vital that they capture the reality of the different environments that the Tuohys and Oher were brought up in. The next step was for Hancock and cinematographer Alar Kivilo to work out lighting and camera angles for the movie. This particular scene takes place on a cold damp night and it appears they chose to use natural light. The idea of course was to capture the natural look and feel of night. The camera focuses on whoever is speaking whether it is Michael or Leigh Anne in order to let the audience get a better visual feel for the individual traits and emotions of the character. The camera also lets the viewers see and get a feel for the emptiness on the road and how alone Michael Oher really is. Along with how cold and alone Michael is this scene also gives a glimpse in the differences between the Tuohy’s and Ohers places in life. The Tuohy’s arrive on the scene in the warmth and comfort of what appears to be a rather new luxury suv, while Michael strolls slowly alone in the cold wet night. When Leigh Anne gets out of the Touy’s suv and approaches Michael her appearance definitely gives the viewers the impression she is well off. Her hair and make-up appear to be perfect and her clothes look new and expensive. In contrast Michael stands there in only a pair of dirty worn out shorts and a faded, dingy short sleeve t shirt. The differences that are between the privileged affluent Tuohys and the under-privileged Michael Oher are obvious to the audience. The overall artistic vision of this film was fantastic. The design team did a great job of making it possible for the audience to identify with the characters and their situations. All the elements of design worked together effectively to help create their mood and fulfill the directors vision of the film. What a great movie this turned out to be. The design team had to rely on lighting, camera angle, costumes, and props to capture the real feel of the story. The 2009 film The Blind Side was based on a true story about Michael Oher, an African American teenager taken in by Leigh Ann Tuohy. The blind side free essay sample Michael soon becomes part of the family and is eventually adopted by the Tuhoy family. Due to his adoption by the Tuhoy family (a wealthy, white family I might add) friends of the Tuhoys start questioning the relationship based off of his race. Michael Oher also struggled with his grades but eventually brings his terrible grades up and starts playing football. He then becomes a star and goes on to play football for Ole miss despite NCAA investigating his family for believing the Tuhoy adopted Michael for the school and not loveable/personal reasons. In 2009 Oher was a 1st round draft pick in the 2009 NFL Draft. He was drafted to the Baltimore Ravens and still plays with them today. C. Michael Ohers self-esteem was at the lowest it could have possibly been at the beginning of the movie. He was separated from his mom at seven, tossed through foster care throughout most of his life, and never had a family to call his own. We will write a custom essay sample on The blind side or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page In the end he has a family that loves and cares for him and is making millions of dollars in the NFL. That is an obvious self-esteem change. D. Oher got support from the Tuhoy family. They offered him a place to sleep when he had nowhere to go. They gave him the family and the unconditional love that Michael never had. They even helped him to improve his grades even though according to many people that he was Just plain stupid. E. Michael Oher as a teenager procrastinated when he had to bring his grades up to play football but with some discipline he was able to get the grades he needed to go to play football and go to college. F. Michael Oher definitely counted his blessings because he had many of them. Those blessing were much bigger than his problems G. This movie can really teach you to be grateful for what you have. As you can see there are many people in this world who doesnt have a family that loves them, a place to sleep, and a place to eat. My current goal right now is to get into college. The biggest way for me to get in is to ace my ACT so I can go to any college of my choosing. With lots of studying, no procrastination, and education I believe I can achieve that goal. The Blind Side free essay sample Belonging is a sense of enlightenment felt when an individual gains an understanding of themselves in relation to others and society. Once the characters belong to their family and to themselves, belonging to society and the rest of the world becomes easy. â€Å"Looking for Alibrandi† by Marlina Marchetta and the film â€Å"The Blind Side† directed by John Lee Hancock, both show how each character gains an understanding of themselves and their family therefore leading to them to belong to society. Throughout the novel, Josie’s perceptions of herself and Nonna’s relationship undergo a significant transformation. Initially, Josie does not feel she belongs to her Nonna because of the limitations she places on her. It is only at the end of the novel that Josie learns the true heart-ache and suffering her Nonna went through for her mother. Marchetta uses the intimate feel of a diary to relate to the story of the three women bound by strong ties of family. We will write a custom essay sample on The Blind Side or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page It shows how each of the women belongs to each other and it also shows the barriers to their relationships. Linear Structure gives the book a strong sense of continuity and ensures a steady pace of the story line. At the beginning of the novel Josie says â€Å"She drives me crazy. Sometimes I have to grit my teeth sometimes to control myself†, showing that she does not feel she belongs to her Nonna. Towards the end she states â€Å"I cried because I was loved by two of the strongest women I would ever meet in my lifetime†. The discovery that she does truly belong to her Nonna encourages Josie to be her own person and to live her life emancipated from any rigid stereotypes that are barriers to belonging. Once she belongs to her Nonna, she then realises she belongs to herself, making belonging to society easier. Cultural identity is a very strong factor in Josie’s life. At first it is a barrier to her belonging to society and she rails against it as being old-fashioned and sexist. She realises towards the end of the book that her culture has made her who she is and what she is capable of becoming. Throughout the novel her references to her culture are often sarcastic or mocking. Josie asserts light heartedly that without the Italian tendency for being chatty and loud â€Å"Telecom would go broke†. Marchetta uses humour to show how Josie speaks with the voice of today’s youth and she speaks of issues that are contemporary and with which readers can relate to. Initially, at school especially, she feels victimised by her race and doesn’t belong. She is bitter and resentful to those not like her and often resorts to physical abuse in response to ‘wog’ insults. â€Å"Simply because like religion, culture is nailed into you so deep you can’t escape it†. This conveys that even though sometimes Josie wishes she wasn’t Italian that makes her who she is. After she learns to accept that towards the end of the novel, she starts to belong to herself and to her culture and then making it easier to belong to her school. At first Josie does not feel as if she belongs to her family, however she comes to a realisation that her culture isn’t a barrier to her belonging; she can then belong to herself and to society. Just like Josie, Michael Oher realises that his race isn’t a barrier to belonging to his family, he belongs to himself and he becomes accepted in society. The Blind Side free essay sample â€Å"The Blind Side† is a movie based on the true events in Michael Oher’s life as he went from being homeless with no father and a mother addicted to drugs, to a star football player in the NFL. Before Oher became number 74 on the Baltimore Ravens, he had little to no schooling. However, Oher also gained support after the Tuohy family provided him with a home and an opportunity. Michael Oher and his character, as portrayed in â€Å"The Blind Side†, both struggled with education for many years before attaining a successful career. There are similarities and differences between his character in the book and in the movie. Michael Oher was born on May 28, 1986 in Memphis Tennessee to Denise Oher and Michael Jerome Williams, whom he never met. His father was murdered when Oher was in high school and although he had his mother around, she was addicted to crack cocaine. We will write a custom essay sample on The Blind Side or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Michael was among 13 other struggling siblings. The children didn’t live together, they were scattered about town trying to live on their own. Michael Oher was homeless, looking for couches or benches to sleep on each night. He was also in and out of foster homes. Michael had so sense of a stable environment.. In the movie, Michael was staying with a friend, Tony Henderson. He had allowed Oher to crash on his couch for the night and decided to have him tag along while he enrolled his own son Steven at Briarcrest Christian School. This was Michael’s first step into education. Prior to this, Michael had repeated first and second grade He never had someone to push him in school, therefore he was never motivated to try. During Michael’s first nine years of education, he had attended eleven different schools. According to The New York Times, Oher had not even attended school for about eighteen months when he was around the age of ten. It is also said that Michael had lost transcripts and was given credit for being in class when he was not present. There were also no records of Oher attending the third grade. Steve Simpson, the principal at Briarcrest, â€Å"knew they passed kids up to the next grade because they found it too much trouble to flunk them†. However, Michael was not willing to have an education at this time. He was often not in class. One record shows that Oher was absent 46 days of a single term of his first-grade year. According to The Ballad of Big Mike, during the 2003 football season at Briarcrest, Oher was still living with several foster families and a football teammate. Steve Simpson was the principal at Briarcrest at the time. Michael was sixteen years old with a measured IQ of 80. Simpson had not seen anyone in a single digit percentile. He had been in the public school system for 30+ years and claimed that teachers had given Michael passing grades just so they wouldn’t have to flunk him. The schools wanted to get rid of Oher. This is the reason he attended so many different schools. His freshman year in high school, Michael played varsity football for a public high school in Memphis called Westwood. According to his transcripts, he had missed a total of fifty days during that year. However, Briarcrest was Michael’s big opportunity to head in the right direction. Tony Henderson personally phoned the principal and said he wanted him in his football program. However, since Michael’s education was not up to par, the principal had agreed to accept him if he completed a home study program. Oher was later accepting into the school but was not allowed at participate in any sports. Jennifer Graves ran the programs for students with special needs at Briarcrest for nine years. She questioned why Michael was accepted into Briarcrest. She once said â€Å"Big Mike had no conception of what real school was about,† she says. â€Å"He’d never have his books with him, didn’t speak in class, nothing. He had no academic background, no foundation at all. † Michael nearly failed every class and the teachers were discouraging. Even Graves said that â€Å"he was a blank slate† meaning that he had been taught nothing in the past and yet he was in the 10th grade. Oher struggled until Leigh Anne Touhy came into his life. It wasn’t until 2004 that the Tuohy family brought him into his home. Before meeting with a tutor that the Tuohy’s provided, Michael’s GPA was a 0. 6. Leigh Anne soon took over Michael’s education completely. She would keep up with grades and encourage Michael. Leigh Anne knew that in order for Oher to play college football, he would need a 2. 65 overall GPA. She then contacted all of Michael’s teachers and asked what Oher needed to do in order to receive a B in the class. Michael still continued to struggle and this was when Leigh Anne contacted Ms. Sue Mitchell. Miss Sue worked with Oher until he was able to raise his grades. In the movie, Miss Sue also met with Michael numerous times in order to improve his education. Miss Sue worked with Oher five nights a week for a total of twenty hours. She received no payment in return either. She sometimes got frustrated but she got attached to Michael and wanted to get him into college. Preferably Ole Miss because this is where she went to college. Due to this help, Michael managed to raise his grade point average to a 2. 05 GPA by the end of his junior year. However, in order to get into a NCAA Division 1 school, he needed to have a 2. 5. Miss Sue also worked with him to achieve this. By the end of his senior year, he had a 2. 52 GPA. In order to achieve the required GPA, Oher took a Brigham Young University course that would replace poor grades with better grades in a single summer. By the end of this course, Michael’s GPA reached over the required limit. After this, Oher started to receive scholarships from various colleges. He received offers from the University of Tennessee, Louisiana State University, Alabama, North Carolina State, Auburn University, and others. Michael finally accepted a scholarship from the University of Mississippi. Michael started at guard then moved to left tackle. He played eleven games for Ole Miss and started ten of them. He was then selected as first team freshman All-American. He kept climbing up the ladder. His sophomore year in college he was selected as second team All-American.. According to The Blind Side: How Michael Oher Made It, after playing just three years for Ole Miss, Michael Oher became eligible for the NFL draft. However, Oher declared that he wanted to return to the University of Miami for his senior year. Oher continued to do well in his college career. Not only did he succeed in football, but he also made the honor roll his senior and sophomore year. Michael graduated college going into the NFL draft. He also received a degree in criminal justice. Michael Oher started off homeless with very little education. The Tuohy family provided him with an opportunity kids like him do not normally get. Oher took full advantage of this and worked hard in order to get where he is today. According to Sean Tuohy, The Movie The Blind Side is almost 100% accurate. It truly shows the struggle of Michael Oher and how he was able to obtain an education, a career, and a family.