One of the best films i have seen

Excellent, a Must See

Am I Missing Something?

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

I saw the movie Blind Faith 4 years ago on Hallmark channel and I was impressed.I told about this movie to all my friends, is a great one and is my favorite,but I want see it again with my friends and I can't find it.Nobody heard about it.Please can somebody help me?How can I find, were?I really want this movie.I am from Romanian and my email address is luiza_dumitru86.When I will have this movie I will show it to everybody because it teach us a lesson and it really deserves to be seen by all people.Please excuse me for my grammatical mistakes but my English is not very good.If somebody can and want help me I wait an email or a message.Thank you.

Of all the dozens of excellent films I have in my collection on VHS, this remains the film I would most like to see transferred to DVD. What a gem! When I originally purchased it without knowing a thing about it, I was slightly intrigued by the fact that the synopsis on the video box makes the film sound like a gritty suspense thriller, one of my favorite genres. The plot sounded interesting – a young black student is accused of murdering a while teen in NYC during the 1950's. OK, sounds like an intriguing piece of drama, I'll take it. So I took it home and was utterly blown away. One plot twist after another, fantastic acting, and a surprise theme about homophobia (which turns out to be the main point of the film) kept me riveted to my seat for the entire film. The story was believable, the drama intense, and the ending heartbreaking. I kept thinking about this film for days after I'd seen it, and since then I have lent my VHS to a half dozen friends, all of who were as emotionally effected by its sincerity as I was. This minor masterpiece, which sadly seems to be quite obscure, is a piece of drama that I would not hesitate to recommend to anyone. If you can manage to find it anywhere, rent it, purchase it, copy it, or steal it. You won't be sorry.

It's difficult to understand the mentality of the film industry when it comes to content that deals with bigotry and race. While trash like like "The Hurricane" get wide distribution, quality films like "Blind Faith" are ignored. I caught this movie early in the morning on a Sunday on a cable movie station, it was really the only thing on. Lucky me. The movie was so powerful I was amazed I'd never heard of it, not an advertisement, review, nothing.The basic plot consists of a black accused of murdering a white and caught up in the legal system of the pre-Civil Rights era. Now that plot line is about as old as they come--well trod territory done with excellence in "To Kill A Mockingbird" and with ugly stupidity in "The Hurricane". But this movie gives us more and better than most legal oriented films of any kind. The film centers on an African-American lawyer, solidly acted by Courtney Vance, defending his nephew who steadfastly refuses to explain the circumstances behind the charge. This serves to explain the lawyer's relationship with his two brothers, one a policeman and father of the accused, and the other, a ne'er-do-well jazz musician. Charles S. Dutton is outstanding as the police officer, tormented and conflicted when his son is accused of murder. He's worked hard and long to achieve his success and status, and it's compelling to watch his rage at seeing all he's built teetering on the edge of a precipice. Courtney B. Vance puts in a fine performance as the lawyer, who is barely able to control his emotions through much of the film. His despair, confusion and anger cause him to periodically lash out, often to the detriment of his own cause.Kadeem Hardison, not a great actor to begin with, muddles through as the jazz musician other brother, a really unnecessary addition, but it serves as an excuse to listen to some really fine music, so perhaps that's reason enough for his inclusion.But for the most part, these are actual characters with nuance and depth, real people caught in a complex situation, not cardboard heroes with cardboard virtues who mouth inane slogans.In one scene the black lawyer coaches a witness to lie on the stand, to commit perjury, out of desperation. In another, the judge upbraids him after he yells at a witness, concluding with "remember your place." The judge could easily be referring to the courtroom and his role as lawyer, or is it a racist comment, as the character takes it to be? The ambiguity enriches the movie, allowing the viewer to think, to ponder the circumstances. The white characters are not evil, they come off mostly as people just trying to do their jobs the best they can. The legal aspect of the movie is very well done too--no torturing the legal system with ridiculous departures from real process, or inane speeches that would be instantly ruled out of order in a real courtroom. The resolution, and a very compelling one it is, doesn't give anybody an easy out--it doesn't allow the viewer to just sit back and feel self satisfied, or blather on about a racist leviathan. It forces one to think about the nature of bigotry and prejudice. I won't say more, since to do so would give away the stellar climax.Perhaps the only flaw is the voice over at the end that explains what happens after the story essentially ends. It's needless and kind of silly, and really only detracts from what is a great film. It's as if the film makers don't trust themselves enough to totally follow through with the ambiguity with which they've left the viewers. It's unfortunate, but a common sin in Hollywood.

In a way, it is easy to see why a movie like Blind Faith was lost in the shuffle; a period piece with an all Black cast that deals with racism. On the other hand, it's hard to imagine why no one has heard of a film this good. It was directed by Ernest Dickerson, long time cinematographer for Spike Lee, and it stars recognizable names, Charles S. Dutton, Courtney B. Vance, Kadeem Hardison and Lonette McKee.The film was produced for Showtime television, had a very limited theatrical run in 1998 and was nominated for several Independent Spirit Awards. I didn't see the film until 1999, when it played at a Film Festival in St. Louis. When I read the cast list and saw who directed it, my jaw dropped. How had this film escaped my radar? I was even further shocked when I saw it. It is (along with Being John Malkovich and Boys Don't Cry) one of the three best films I've seen in 1999 and one of the most powerful films I've seen since Uli Edel's Last Exit to Brooklyn, ten years ago.The film is the story of a young Black boy named Charles Jr., a cop's son, accused of murdering a young white boy in civil rights era New York City. He confesses to the crime and refuses to do anything in his own defense, which his uncle John, who is also his lawyer, can't understand. The boy has no history of violence or crime and was basically a quiet unassuming kid.In spite of the lack of cooperation from Charles Jr., John mounts a defense, even though the prosecution seems to have an open and shut case and is pushing for the death penalty. To give away more would be as big a crime as revealing the plot twists at the climax of The Sixth Sense or Fight Club.What makes this movie so great is its subtlety and its realism. The Black characters are not saints and the white characters are not demons. Movies like this tend to sacrifice their power to sentimentality by making the minority characters into martyrs and heroes that are beyond reproach. Also, this film makes us like the white characters, so that when their racism finally shows, it is all the more shocking.Frank Military's script pulls off the difficult task of making us care about a story we think we've seen before, and then lets us know that we haven't seen it before. This movie is so much more powerful than preachy, Hollywood stuff, like Ghosts of Mississippi, that it eclipses those films completely. This is a hard hitting story of race and justice that all Americans need to see.