ABSTRACT
Let’s get one thing straight right away. This isn’t going to be one of those movies where they put their words into our mouths. This isn’t Magnificent Obsession, blind Jane Wyman isn’t going to blink back a tear when the doctors tell her they can’t cure her after all, saying, “and I thought I was going to be able to get rid of these,” gesturing with her ridiculous rhinestone-studded, catseye dark glasses (and we think, “Really, Jane,”); she’s not going to tell Rock Hudson she can’t marry him: “I won’t have you pitied because of me. I love you too much,” and “I could only be a burden,” and then disappear until the last scene when, lingering on the border between death and cure (the only two acceptable states), Rock saves her life and her sight and they live happily ever after. It’s not going to be A Patch of Blue: when the sterling young Negro hands us the dark glasses and, in answer to our question: “But what are they for?” says “Never
mind, put them on,” we’re not going to grab them, hide our stone Medusa gaze, grateful for the magic that’s made us a pretty girl. This isn’t Johnny Belinda, we’re not sweetly mute, surrounded by an aura of silence. No, in this movie the blind women have milky eyes that make the sighted uncomfortable. The deaf women drag metal against metal, oblivious to the jarring sound, make odd cries of delight at the sight of the ocean, squawk when we are angry.
