BEFORE: Capping off a week of disabilities and dysfunction - blindness, OCD, alcoholism, dwarfism, and now cerebarl palsy. And Birthday SHOUT-out #36 to Daniel Day Lewis - this will kick off a three-day tribute. Linking from last night, Peter Dinklage was in "Living in Oblivion" with Catherine Keener, who was in "The Ballad of Jack and Rose" with Daniel Day Lewis (last seen in "Gangs of New York")
THE PLOT: The story of Christy Brown, who was born with cerebral palsy. He learned to paint and write with his only controllable limb - his left foot.
AFTER: Ach, I'm pretty torn on this one. Partially because this is so much Oscar bait - the Academy's got a long history of rewarding actors playing disabled people, and partially because it causes me to question what constitutes acting in such a film. When does acting disabled become disrespectful? When it involves grunting and talking in a distorted fashion, I'm not very impressed by it - not in the same way that I'm impressed by someone able to type with their foot.
I just want to call a mulligan on this one, because I don't want to buck the Academy Awards, but I do think that given enough time, the decision to reward this performance may become more questionable.
Also starring Brenda Fricker (last seen in "A Time to Kill"), Ray McAnally (last seen in "The Fourth Protocol"), Fiona Shaw (last seen in "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix").
RATING: 4 out of 10 lumps of coal
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