In case you're missing the point that Oher is a pauper swept into the land of plenty, director and script writer John Lee Hancock has him stare at a blown-up Norman Rockwell Saturday Evening Post cover his first night in the house after everyone else has gone to bed.
Fed a steady diet of kindness and material goods by the Tuohys, Oher begins to - you guessed it - blossom.
The Blind Side wisely takes its time before playing its trump card: football. The real Oher was a heavily recruited high school prospect, a lineman who currently plays for the NFL's Baltimore Ravens.
The movie is a kind of My Fair Tackle with a discomfiting racial overlay. Blacks live in weed-strewn projects ruled by crack dealers. Apparently, their best hope is to latch onto a white benefactor styled by Ralph Lauren.
Bullock is terrific as this fable's Professor Higgins. Her Leigh Anne is a mix of Southern decorum and sass, a woman who hides her big heart under a bossy, no-nonsense shell.
Like most of the characters in The Blind Side, she undergoes instantaneous and convenient conversions.
Over lunch, she suddenly discovers that her best gal pals - together they look like The Real Housewives of Memphis - are narrow-minded bigots. No hint of this ever emerged in the thousands of Cobb salads she shared with them over the years?
A quick and implausible on-field pep talk from Leigh Anne (a speech prominently featured in trailers and ads for the film) transforms Michael from a clumsy and passive player into an unstoppable pile-driver.
McGraw, nearly unrecognizable with a clean shave and an Alfalfa part in his hair, is appealing when given an opening, but he's mostly there to hold Bullock's purse.
The scene-stealer is supposed to be their freckly young son S.J. (Jae Head), but he's too impish and precious by half. Watching the kid put Big Mike through a rigorous training regimen, assemble a recruiting-highlights disc, and negotiate with high-powered college coaches (Nick Saban, Lou Holtz, Phillip Fulmer, Tommy Tuberville, and others play themselves) is reminiscent of Timothy Mouse leading around Dumbo.
Kathy Bates makes a late appearance as a miracle tutor. She has the best accent in the cast. Then again, she is a Memphis native.
However obvious, The Blind Side is touching - despite its habit of dropping major character notes into the melody without warning. For instance, Leigh Anne suddenly starts spouting pieties in her final voice-over.
Praise the Lord and roll the credits.
Contact staff writer David Hiltbrand at 215-854-4552 or dhiltbrand@phillynews.com. Read his recent work at http://go.philly.com/daveondemand.
