Review of At First Sight (1999) by Alex M — 11 Sep 2011

[size=3]One of the greatest moments in cinema history is the ending of Charlie Chaplin's [i]City Lights[/i]: a blind girl who has had an operation slowly has her bandages removed and sees that the man she loves, the man who has financed her operation, isn't the suave millionaire she suspected but the homely, down-to-earth Tramp character that Chaplin embodied. In Irwin Winkler's movie [i]At First Sight, [/i]the sexes are reversed, as a blind man (Val Kilmer) is aided by his love (Mira Sorvino) in learning to cope with having his vision restored. [i]At First Sight [/i]is a sweet, gentle movie, but it is completely unimaginative and frankly unnecessary. There are very few moments that ring true in the film, and many that seem like contrived Hollywood hokum. Sorvino plays Amy, a successful architect who meets Virgil (Kilmer), a blind masseuse, and slowly falls in love with him. Although Virgil is blind, he is so in tune with the other sensory pleasures of the world that he is able to rekindle Amy's own passion for life. When Virgil gets an operation to repair his sight, he finds that what he can see has no context, and Amy must aid him through the process of learning to see again. [i]At First Sight [/i]does not have any pretenses of high art...it simply wants to be a romantic tearjerker with a few observations about the magic of our senses. Yet while Val Kilmer and Mira Sorvino are both effortlessly charming, the lines that they are forced to read often sound contrived and hokey. As a result, the movie is not as forceful or moving as it should be. Penny Marshall's film [i]Awakenings [/i]is also about a person who is temporarily cured of a disability, but it succeeds in moving us because it is an intelligent drama that creates real and unique characters. This film wallows in unearned sentiment and corny speeches about the magic of love. The true story that [i]At First Sight [/i]was based on is no doubt a moving account of bravery, adjustment and true love. It deserves a movie that captures those qualities. That movie has yet to be made.[/size].

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