I thought “The Blind Side” true story took place in Tennessee. Did Hollywood move it to Texas so they could make digs at Bush??? And I thought Sandra Bullock’s accent was trying to imitate Tennessee. You’re correct, she IS from Texas, and I think she LIVES in Texas, so she ought to be able to do a passable Texas accent.

DG in GA on November 20, 2009 at 1:10 pm

Somehow I missed that Oprah was behind “Precious”. Imagine how many of her celebrifrinds said “NO!” before Mariah Carey took the bait.
Debbie, is the the first review to recieve a “Plus an Obama” rating? Shouldn’t there be some sort of ceremony? Kidding.
Sandy Bullock is better than this. She shone in “The Proposal”
and I have liked her earlier work, for the most part.
White guilt is boring.

Douglas Q on November 20, 2009 at 1:14 pm

O/T:

Muslim teenagers tape themselves assaulting/beating random people on the street:

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=b02_1258670061

R.R. on November 20, 2009 at 1:24 pm

Debbie,

I enjoy reading your reviews.

I saw an ad for the movie Precious a couple of night ago. Who would pay money to go and see such a depressing film? The few seconds I saw of it in the commercial told me that it was awful.

Thanks for doing the dirty work for us.

SWQ on November 20, 2009 at 2:08 pm

O/T:

Muslim teenagers tape themselves assaulting/beating random people on the street:

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=b02_1258670061

R.R. on November 20, 2009 at 1:24 pm

They look like Muslim Somalian trash. When we important barbarians like these onto our shores, what do we expect?

JM on November 20, 2009 at 2:26 pm

My daughter and I saw Planet 51 this morning. I was surprised at how cute it was. The whole lesson behind it was not to fear the unknown. It wasn’t overly preachy or anything like that. The pop culture references were really funny. A song lyric here, a movie reference there…they even made fun of the token hippie.

The best character was the little alien puppy that looked like the Alien from Aliens. He even peed acid. The camera didn’t focus on it. You just saw an acid cloud the 2 times he relieved himself.

I just thought it was a cute movie.

cirrus1701 on November 20, 2009 at 3:25 pm

Here is another “Blind Side” story taking place right now in Lynnwood, Washington. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/highschoolsports/2010176977_naji01.html Naji Moore-Taylor is leading his high school team into the playoffs. Someone needs to be making a documentary on him right now instead of having his story ruined by a movie…

arby on November 20, 2009 at 3:51 pm

Well, you know, “Precious” is going to sweep the Oscars.

lexi on November 20, 2009 at 4:37 pm

Precious is basically giving an excuse to fat welfare mothers that their transgressions in life are excused because everyone gave them a raw deal in life. So fat welfare mothers will walk away thinking their reckless life was not by their own will. Precious is the ultimate victim of you guessed it an absent worthless father. The fat welfare mothers will take away that their children were by absent worthless men. Creating a larger entitlement mentality because they are the coveted ‘victims’ in society. Instead of giving people with low self esteem optimism or education on their shortcomings, society gives them victimization. Basically they are told to ignore their transgressions and blame society for not accepting their reckless behavior. And we pay more in higher taxes.

Personally fat single mothers are usually the most overbearing people you could find. They should have shame in their physical appearance and should not be so demanding that other change their life for their obesity problem. And MT.HOprah is behind this one? Yes, pathetic. Seeing that trailer was disgusting.

FAT WOMEN GO AWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYY!!!

CaliforniaScreaming on November 20, 2009 at 6:02 pm

I watched michael jackson this is it because of your review and was plesantly surprised that I could enjoy it that much,the guy was a genius.thanks so much
I cant bring myself to watch precious the story is just to miserable and I wonder what the is craze about new moon?
I might stay at home this week or watch this is it again

blondy on November 20, 2009 at 7:31 pm

Debbie, I waited all night for your review of “New Moon,” and checked just before leaving the theater to see if it was posted yet. It wasn’t. You owe me $21!!! What a piece of over-hyped drivel! Twenty minutes in, I was ROOTING for that dizzy broad to succeed in killing herself! As much as anyone liked the first movie, they will absolutely HATE this one. Guys, seriously, stay home!

Helen on November 20, 2009 at 8:29 pm

Debbie, I think you misunderstood the message of “Precious”.
It didn’t glorify rape and incest.
Far from it.
Precious’s father was portrayed as a monster for what he did to his daughter.
And CaliforniaScreaming’s comments about “fat people” was very immature and childish.

Debbie, I enjoy your reviews but I didn’t enjoy the cruel attacks on the actress Mo’Nique.
You keep lambasting this woman. Why? She isn’t a terrible actress and she’s not a bad person.
She’s a harmless lady who is an entertainer and a thespian.

C’mon! Stop with the hostility!
You know better than to sling ad hominem attacks at a woman who has never done you any harm.

Charybdis_SeaStar on November 20, 2009 at 8:46 pm

Love the + Obama rating.lol

Hermster on November 20, 2009 at 9:18 pm

Debbie, what a hilarious misinterpretation of “Precious”.

At what point in the movie is rape and incest glorified. How could you have possibly come to that conclusion when watching this film.

I’m starting to think that you followed that “older White (why did you specify his color?) guy” out because your review made no sense.

CL: RIF–Reading Is Fundamental. Never said this movie glorifies those things, but gangsta lit does. That’s what I wrote. Try reading b/f you repeat the false talking points the hip-hop sites told you and the other haters to post here. DS

Cillian Lynch on November 20, 2009 at 9:23 pm

Precious is a anti welfare movie it appear to me that you and others that follow your site can’t separate the politics from art. Your statement is very unfair and unfortunate regarding this movie not a any moment does this film glorify any of the negative behavior you just mentioned in that statement. I think your harsh review of Precious has less to do with the movie and more to do with your dislike of Oprah. I know many of you conservatives are still pissed that Oprah supported Obama move on. Next time when reviewing a movie try not to be so bias did you even watch Precious it doesn’t glorify none of the negative stuff you just said.This movie is about a huge woman that has gone thru hell and yet at the end she makes it thru the storm it’s a story about a person overcoming their bad situation it is meant to inspire people not bring them down.

TheMethod on November 20, 2009 at 11:46 pm

Like Hermster, the 4 Marx’s + an Obama has to be a classic, no matter how one agrees with your review.

jwb on November 21, 2009 at 11:56 am

You are so ridiculously ignorant, Debbie. That, or you’re just plain stupid. I honestly can’t figure out which. I’ve never seen anyone misinterpret ANY movie as much as you have misinterpreted Precious.

It’s not even a matter of me disagreeing with what you said. It’s a matter of you being totally, absolutely wrong about the movie. The fact is, everything you said it “glorifies”, it condemns. You’re just so pathetically clueless.

C: RIF–Reading Is Fundamental. Never said this movie glorifies those things, but gangsta lit does. That’s what I wrote. Try reading b/f you repeat the talking points the hip-hop sites told you and the other haters to post here. DS

Conner on November 21, 2009 at 3:27 pm

Charybdis SeaStar I think you got it wrong. Many in society dont see fat unwed single mothers as victims. First, their weight was gained by overeating a lack of self control. Second their unwed single mother status was a result of their sexual transgressions. No one forces them to eat so much or have sex that results in children without the financial means to support them.
So Hollywood wants us to feel sympathy for fat unwed mothers as victims. Enough of Jerry Springer and fat unwed mothers or Maury and fat unwed mothers. Well lets create a storyline where the fat unwed mother is a victim of incest. Extend that to all fat unwed mothers are a victim of men. Remember having a story of a fat unwed mother eating and sleeping around wont garner sympathy. Hollywood wants us to change our thinking of fat unwed mothers because they need ‘victimization-hood’ too. They then cant be accountable for their actions. Similar to homosexuals, illegal aliens, Muslim terrorists, etc. They all get the victim status. So the greater society cant condemn their actions. Thank You HOprah as she picks up her Oscar.

CaliforniaScreaming on November 21, 2009 at 6:36 pm

“This movie is about a huge woman that has gone thru hell and yet at the end she makes it thru the storm it’s a story about a person overcoming their bad situation it is meant to inspire people not bring them down.
TheMethod”

I’m sorry but I just can’t see how this movie (Precious) could inspire anyone. “Rape, incest, torture, prison life, gang life, prostutition, welfare, and drug-dealing” along with “morbidly obese teen girl raped by her father and impregnated twice by him, Down Syndrome baby, abusive mother, AIDS, HIV….the end” just doesn’t sound all that inspiring. Have you seen it? Does she ever escape her situation? Because in most cases: she stays on welfare, finds an abusive man who along with her will put her kids through the same situation and so on till the cycle repeats itself again with the next generation. If this movie proves anything it’s what a dismal joke the whole welfare program is.
And Monique, well, she’s just gracefull as a swan…do I really want to spend my money to watch a bunch of morbidly obese people abuse themselves…Nah.
Yes, some people do have a real medical excuse for their weight problems, but not most. Maybey the gov’t needs to cut back on the Food Stamps too!
To Cillian Lynch: I’m your typical “older White guy” and wouldn’t enjoy this movie either. Frankly I’m sick and tired of these senseless self pity movies that simply go nowhere and don’t tell me anything new. Total waste of my time.

And I like Sandra Bullok but she is getting redundant. Like Merrill Streep, whenever I see her in a movie I don’t see the character, I just see “Sandra Bullock” but at least she’s not playing a cutsey teenage type role, this time.

As for these new vampire movies, just comical.
Dracula means ‘son of the devil’ not ‘son of Valentino’!

theShadow on November 21, 2009 at 6:52 pm

Wow, Debbie are these Precious loving movie goers all from some website that told them to come here and say the same thing? Kind of creepy if you ask me.

As far as New Moon, my girlfriends and I are all part of the same moms group. We got together for a Mom’s Night Out (trust me, none of our husbands wanted to see this movie; they were practically pushing us out of the door), had a great dinner together and saw the movie on it’s opening night. Was the movie ridiculous? Absolutely! Were we laughing our heads off at various parts of the movie that were not supposed to be funny? You bet! But it was a great night and so much fun.

shortylion on November 22, 2009 at 2:11 am

While “Precious” is indeed harrowing, I think Schlussel completely misses its message. The film definitely doesn’t glorify being on welfare or being obese, as CaliforniaScreaming seems to think. In fact, the driving theme of the movie is the importance of literacy–Precious’ life doesn’t improve until she gets an education. When she learns to express herself on paper she’s able to express herself in life. And while her character is indeed one of the most loathsome I’ve ever seen on film, Mo’Nique gives an outstanding performance, as does “Precious” herself, acting newcomer Gaboure Sidibe. As a black person I definitely have mixed feelings about its’ portrayal of blacks (and the fact that all the characters that help the dark skinned Precious are all conspicuously light-skinned but that’s another story), and it’s not for the fainthearted, but the film is far from garbage.

joconde on November 22, 2009 at 3:12 am

joconde, I never said they were glorifying fat unwed mothers. The point is Hollywood wants to portray them as victims in society. HOprah created this movie to soften up society on fat unwed mothers. HOprah want us to believe “there is a “Precious” in every fat unwed mother”. Maybe Precious is a true victim for arguments sake, but they want to extend it to all fat unwed mothers. They don’t want fat unwed mothers accountable for their bad choices in life. In fact if I had it my way more men would be in jail for non-payment of child support. These scumbag men leave a trail behind. We as taxpayers pay such a huge tax bill because of all these messed up people. However it still doesn’t excuse fat unwed mothers for their bad behaviors.

This is a liberal’s take on Precious:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mark-blankenship/the-movie-precious-tells_b_350924.html
Mark Blankenship, Huffington Post
Of course, Precious takes place in 1987. We can go to Harlem right now and see that there are still plenty of people who suffer there. So what should we do about it? Should we pump our energy into the systems that try to help the poor and abused? Maybe we should. Maybe we can spare the next generation from the fate that befell their ancestors. Precious, at least, encourages us to try.

PUUUUUUUUUUUUUKE!!!
Yes he wants us to pour MORE MONEY into failed social programs that don’t work. There is never enough money to fix messed up people. Tell them the greatest help is within. Try self determination and having a moral compass.

Here is a hall of shame of “baby daddys.”
http://www.faniq.com/blog/Athletes-With-Illegitimate-Kids-The-Comprehensive-List-Blog-17243

CaliforniaScreaming on November 22, 2009 at 7:17 pm

Debbie, You totally missed it on “Blindside”. A very good movie, set in Tennessee, not Texas. It was very entertaining and it did a good job with the racial scenes, realistic not PC. I would pay to see it again.

Big Daddy on November 23, 2009 at 1:22 pm

You missed the point of Precious. It might not be a happy movie but it does show that with education precious and those in situations like her or worse can rise above.

Mr. White on November 23, 2009 at 2:21 pm

“Maybe Precious is a true victim for arguments sake”

CaliforniaScreaming, that was the point of the movie.

And no, the film does not portray her as a “fat unwed mother.”
It portrays her as a person.
If anything, her mother is shown as the real monster.

Charybdis_SeaStar on November 23, 2009 at 7:09 pm

Charybdis SeaStar, Precious is a fairy tale. So HOprah wants us to conjure up feelings about this non-existant person. HOprah is the story teller and since Precious doesn’t exist she is a “victim” from the point of view of HOprah.

Lets walk through this

1. Precious is fat,
2. Precious is not married therefore unwed
3. Precious has two children and is a mother.

Therefore Precious is a fat unwed mother. Duuuhhhhh. Yes she is person. My point is people get in their positions by choices. Good or Bad. My belief like I said for anyone who needs help is self determination, education, optimism, and a good moral compass (religion). However liberals dont give encouragement just victimization. Victimization allows the “victim” not to be accountable of their own transgressions.

It is the portrayal of the movie. The purpose of the movie is to change societies view of “fat unwed mothers.” Many people aren’t so sympathetic for people’s obesity problems or their sexual transgressions. No Precious wasnt sexually promiscuous. However when one sees a fat unwed mother. People make judgements. Most people assume having a child out of wedlock is not the most desirable setting for a child. Aint gonna change my views about obese promiscuous women for HOprah.

The writer I cited changed his view and that is the point that HOprah is trying to make.

CaliforniaScreaming on November 23, 2009 at 11:04 pm

Man, if anything I ever made received “Four Marxes plus an Obama”….

Well, I just don’t think I could come back from that.

Nills on November 24, 2009 at 1:36 am

Debbie,

I have to agree with Big Daddy. Blind Side takes place in Memphis, TN not Texas. I thought Sandra Bullock’s accent was fairly accurate: Southern.

I was amazed at how accurate the movie was. I sensed about as much racism in the movie as we have now, a little. I thought the characters were pretty realistic. In short, an amazing and true story.

If you want to criticize something, you may want to chime in about Sandra Bullock’s latest roles as a Super-Woman out to castrate men. In Blind Side, they actually added the phrase “cut your penis off” to her script when she warned Oher about knocking up anyone at college.

In her movie “The Proposal” she was equally portrayed as a Super-Duper executive who can do anything she wants including firing other executives and forcing a collegue to marry her. Again, another scene where she threatened the sexual organs of her male boy toy took place.

Joe on November 24, 2009 at 4:49 pm

Your review of New Moon is right on target in every way. All your criticisms of the film are fair, and your comment about older women who drool over the film were hilarious, probably sadly true. I, too, like you, preferred Meyer’s earlier Twilight adaptation(Catherine Hardwicke who directed Thirteen directed the earlier film, and I think she emphasizes mood and character over adrenaline-driven action) but my teen daughter and all her friends prefer the second in the series, so I wonder what that says (that my daughter has bad taste in movies perhaps?) I think the problem with both films in the series is that they are teen-centered rather than adult-centered, but that’s the problem with Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet on which both stories are patterned, too.
I also saw Planet 51 and thought it was lame. There were lots of weak gags but I rarely smiled. However, in its favor, it didn’t include a lot of liberal propaganda, and as Cirrus pointed out above, the movie even made fun of hippies (hurray for that!). There were attractive stars (like Duane Johnson) but their regular movie personae didn’t much shine through in this story so it didn’t really matter.
Blind Side was absolute, unadulterated liberal-talking points trash. I hated that movie! Bullock plays an Erin Brokovich replica–sassy, feisty, low-cut-dress wearing “champion” of society’s needy. This film makes you appreciate Thomas Sowell’s observation, that liberal elites casually use African-Americans as “mascots.” And the climax–the supposedly horrible guilt and deep soul-searching the family undergoes concerning whether there might have been some selfish motive in bringing the boy into the family–made me sick.
Now, as to the last movie, I’m sorry to admit, since I agree with you so completely on your movie reviews in general, Debbie, that I liked Precious. I agree with your observations about gangsta lit and the way it seductively and indirectly exploits, and I’m no admirer of Oprah, but I saw this film as an attempt at soft (middlebrow) social realism. Although the heroes (social worker and free-thinking lesbian teacher) followed the liberal template talking points, the villains, for a change, were not white men or women (whew, what a relief!)at least. Although I disagreed with the social prescription suggested in the story (increasing welfare services) I did NOT disagree with the portrait of inner city welfare families as being severely messed up! I don’t mind looking at the brutal pathologies that afflict our misguided society; it reminds me how important it is to get our nation back on track before we lose our middle class and we all slide downward into a swamp of government-dependant decay.

Burke on November 27, 2009 at 10:13 pm

You really missed the boat with your review of PRECIOUS
By the way, Mo’Nique gives one of the best “Supporting Actress” performances I’ve ever seen.

Stan on December 5, 2009 at 2:11 pm

I found Precious a realistic account of the black underclass. The protagonist was happy to meet teachers who care for her, but it is obvious that the black underclass produces far more kids in problematic situations & with low IQs than there are teachers. This causes a lot of misery, both for the people involved as for society. Eventually we should consider sterilization or Depo-Provera. But aborting welfare is perhaps a start.

Bernadette de Wit on December 7, 2009 at 10:02 am

Did Oprah make this movie to finally tell the truth about the incredible destruction that welfare has wrought on the black community? Personally, I prefer Tyler Perry’s films. I love Medea when she gets mad.

Marcy O on December 20, 2009 at 4:01 pm

“Sadly, this movie is just the silver screen incarnation of a growing phenomenon in Black urban America: gangsta lit or ghetto lit. That genre glorifies rape, incest, torture, prison life, gang life, prostutition, welfare, and drug-dealing.”

“Leading Black Americans, like Oprah and Tyler Perry, bring Black America this kind of “culture,” and then Black America blames White America when the Black underclass expands because Black America emulates this lifestyle.”

No, Debbie, you ARE suggesting “Precious” glorifies rape, incest, welfare, etc. Nothing could be further from the truth. Sexual abuse is reality. So are girls who get pregnant as a result of abuse and see no way out. Precious is not glamorizing abuse anymore than war movies glamorize war.

And what if you got raped and became pregnant as a result? I guess that would make you a skinny unwed mother. That’s a frightening thought, because you have no nurturing or compassionate instincts. You enjoy anger and seek out that which arouses anger in you. Thank God you don’t have children.

Teresa on March 26, 2010 at 11:48 am

Precious was crap!!! Just to clarify something, Oprah and
Tyler Perry are leadind “Black Americans” to the liberal entertainment indusrty.Black America blames hollywood for the dehumanizing images it markets to “White America”.The expanding Black underclass is due in part to the demoralizing “enforced otherness” propaganda,Of which Precious is a prime example.Most Black Americans would rather see Blacks in the lamest screwball comedy than this sh-t!

steve on April 30, 2010 at 5:37 pm