how did this win an award?

Rating: 3/10 (8 March 2010)

I think the Acadamy is being very kind to Sandra Bullock by giving her the best actress award for this movie. Rarely have I seen a more irritating, feel good fetish. It is so predictable that it would be almost impossible to include spoilers in the review, but for the benefit of the mentally deficient I'll try not to give away too much. Basically, its the story of a gentle giant who gets adopted by the most nauseatingly nice family since the Brady Bunch. Our hero, "Big Mike" is a misfit kid from the projects who gets accepted into a high performing high school. One night, as he's making his way to the gym, were he sleeps, the Touhey family take pity on him and take him into their perfect family home. This is were Sandra Bullock takes control of the plot and of the whole movie. There's no doubt in my mind that Director John Lee Hancock molded this movie to make Sandra Bullock look like the award winning actress she isn't. Her husband, Sean, played by Tim McGraw, is the most pointless character in movie history. Even a henpecked husband would be more humorous than the impotent piece of passivity this man represents. Son, S.J., played by Jae Head, is one of those annoying child characters who gets way too much screen time and daughter, Collins, played by Lily Collins has to be the most understanding teenage girl ever to feature in a Hollywood movie. Quinton Aaron, who plays "Big Mike" does as good a job as he's let, given that he dare not steal attention from Sandra Bullock's dominance. There's one good scene when he returns to the bad guys in the projects were he grew up. It's the only good scene actually, probably because Sandra Bullock is not in it. I won't bore you with the details of the whole football plot, you'll guess were its going very early on; especially when Sandra Bullock's character starts telling the coach what to do. Apart from the "Boys in the Hood" in Mike's old neighborhood, there's just one other bad guy, but he's just a loud mouth racist at a football game who Sandra Bullock deals with predictably. There's shades of "Mr. Holland's Opus" "Good Will Hunting" and even "Shine" in this movie. Sadly though, those shades are quickly obliterated by Miss Bullocks ego.