i know i wasted 90 mins of my life.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

If you are a favorite of British crime dramas, the Second Sight series are a "must see." They star Clive Owen who has become more well-known to US audiences from his roles in the exciting and thoughtful science fiction shocker Children of Men and in the action mystery Inside Man which I found to be thoroughly entertaining. Owen, at first, appears to be very rough hewn, but he has the ability to express a tough vulnerability (an oxymoron?) that makes him perfect for the role of DCI Ross Tanner in the Second Sight series.Tanner is not a very likable man. He's a drunk, a womanizer, a neglectful father, and a tough boss, but he is very good at his job - thus he is the head of a police unit that investigates high-profile crimes - mostly homicides. Tanner begins to have some problems with his vision and finds that he has contracted a rare disease known as acute zonal occult outer retinopathy (AZOOR). The symptoms are blurred vision, blind spots, and flashes of light. In many cases, full vision returns after a period of time. Tanner - being the introspective, shut off man that he is - decides to hide his condition with the hope that his normal vision will return.The flashes of light are used to dramatic effect in the series by taking on flashes of images that appear to Tanner which often help him to solve the crimes. This technique is overdone, but it serves to give us insight into the mind of this brilliant detective.The first series concerns just one crime which is the complex tale of the murder of a young man. In this first series, Tanner accepts the help of a female detective in his unit who perceives the vision problem. He and the detective also have a sexual relationship. It is through this relationship and his strained relationship with his son that we get some insight into the more human side of the man.In the first episode of the second series, Tanner's relationship with his paramour comes to an end. The second series comprises three different crimes and also offers us a further look into the human side of Tanner. All three are neatly tied together by Tanner's developing condition, and each crime offers exposes different aspects of the British personality and society. Especially notable in Kingdom of the Blind is a chilling performance by veteran actor, Peter Vaughan who his more often seen in lighter roles.British television drama has a special way of portraying the women and men of the police forces who must deal with the criminal element. Second Sight certainly ranks near the top of those dramas.

This series is a sensitive portrayal of a police investigator coping with an increasing deprivation of sight. This portrayal includes the personal pain that accompanies the gradual loss of a sense faculty that is taken to be essential to the profession of the individual concerned. What is impressive about the writing of this series is how this assumption about the essential character of sight (for such professions as investigation) is undermined without the use of clichés or cheese. Overall, the dialog is well written, the story lines interesting, and the personal lives of the main characters (when they are included at all) are seamlessly written into each episode. Well worth the time to watch, more than once.

Clive Owen brings his almost complete absence of charisma and scant repertoire of nuances to "Second Sight" as a detective who may or may not be losing his sight depending on who you believe; host Diana Rigg or the doctor characters. A much too pat and uninspired Brit detective series about a workaholic divorced sleuth with personal issues, DCI Tanner (Owen), "Second Sight" is full of nonsequiturs, plot holes, and just plain shoddy work. Owen does the usual connecting of dots expected of mysteries while maintaining the pitiful I've-been-screwed-by-life attitude you would expect of a terminal cancer patient not one whose just may be going blind and especially not one who sees perfectly when required of the plot and otherwise when not. All the while, Tanner has what Rigg describes as a "torrid" affair with his sidekick which is little more than a few seconds in the sack and sees visions (the second sight thing) which are rationalized by some mumbo-jumbo about his medical condition. Pale in comparison with the Brit "Cracker" series, "Second Sight" is little more than par fodder for TV junkies. I gave up on it with about 10 minutes to go in the 2nd DVD. (C+)

My TV watching is confined almost exclusively to PBS and the British shows, which are usually the only things on TV worth watching. BUT... this particular show suffers from an excess of unintelligible dialogue that only added to the confusion of the muddled plot and story, the jerky handheld camera work, the appallingly choppy editing and uncertain direction. May I suggest to Rebecca Eaton that she add sub-titles to this show (which still has a few episodes to run) so that American viewers can truly enjoy rather than endure the British dialects and poor diction of the performers.