{"id":8967,"date":"2024-11-27T13:08:50","date_gmt":"2024-11-27T18:08:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=8967"},"modified":"2024-11-27T13:08:50","modified_gmt":"2024-11-27T18:08:50","slug":"children-of-a-lesser-god","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/11\/27\/children-of-a-lesser-god\/","title":{"rendered":"Children of a Lesser God"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Children of a Lesser God <\/strong>(1986)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Paramount\/Drama\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 118 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (language, sexual content, partial nudity)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Randa Haines\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Hesper Anderson and Mark Medoff\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Michael Convertino\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: John Seale \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Release date: October 3, 1986 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: William Hurt, Marlee Matlin, Piper Laurie, Philip Bosco, Allison Gompf, John F. Cleary, Philip Holmes, Georgia Ann Cline, William D. Byrd, Frank Carter Jr., John Limnidis, Bob Hiltermann, E. Katherine Kerr, John Basinger, Barry Magnani, Linda Bove, Ann Hanson, James Carrington.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $31.8M (US)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: ****<\/p>\n

\u00a0I often wondered about the meaning of the title Children of a Lesser God<\/strong>, the Tony-winning play by Mark Medoff later made into an Oscar-winning film by Randa Haines (Something About Amelia). It comes from the epic poem \u201cIdylls of the King\u201d by Alfred Lord Tennyson. The line goes, \u201cO me! For why is all around us here\/As if some lesser god had made the world.\u201d The idea seems to be imperfect people are created in the image of an imperfect or lesser god. In some old versions of Christianity, this imperfect god is known as Demiurge. The title then refers to the main character, a deaf woman in love with a hearing man. And you thought your relationship was complicated.<\/p>\n

\u00a0James Leeds (Hurt, Body Heat), the idealistic new speech teacher at a school for the deaf, arrives with great ideas and good intentions. He wants his students (and everybody else) to learn to speak so they can make it in the world. Not everybody shares his enthusiasm, especially not Sarah Norman (Matlin in her acting debut), a former top student at the school who now works there as a janitor. She\u2019s angry, rebellious and stubborn. Although he persists, she refuses to learn to speak. She does, however, agree to go out with him. They eventually start a romantic relationship that\u2019s made complicated by his continued efforts to get her to speak and her refusal to let him into her world of silence.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Children of a Lesser God <\/strong>holds the honor of being the first female-directed film to be nominated for Best Picture. Unfortunately, Haines was NOT nominated for Best Director. However, the Academy redeemed itself somewhat by awarding Matlin the Oscar for Best Actress. Not only does the 21YO actress remain the youngest winner in that category, she\u2019s also the only deaf Academy Award winner in ANY category. That she received it for her first performance makes it even more amazing. It\u2019s totally deserved!<\/p>\n

\u00a0Matlin, who signs nearly all of her dialogue (save for a few words), delivers a powerful performance as Sarah. In her life, she\u2019s managed to shut everybody out including her mother (Laurie, Carrie) to whom she hasn\u2019t \u201cspoken\u201d in years. She has her reasons for being mad at the hearing world. Her way of dealing with the cruel world is not being part of it. She opts to live in silence rather than learn to speak or read lips. Her fear of hurt and rejection is absolutely palpable. 35 years later, I\u2019m still impressed with what Marlee does.<\/p>\n

The novice actress more than holds her own against Hurt in one of his finest performances ever. As James, he does incredible work. He\u2019s a well-meaning sort who thinks he\u2019s doing good by teaching the deaf to speak, but fails to see that some would rather not. The two leads have great chemistry. Their final scene still holds tremendous power. Laurie, in her few scenes, is terrific as the estranged mother with issues of her own. Philip Bosco (The Dream Team) is also very good as the cynical school headmaster who isn\u2019t totally on board with James and Sarah being together.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Children of a Lesser God<\/strong> may sound like one of those sappy 70s love stories that used terminal illness or physical disability as a gimmick, but it\u2019s not. It\u2019s more serious-minded than the likes of Love Story or Ice Castles, one of the few movies where I didn\u2019t stifle the urge to scream out loud at the end. It doesn\u2019t condescend to the deaf girl by making her come off as a saint or object of pity. She\u2019s a realistic, fully formed character with flaws. Also, it doesn\u2019t allow James to be some kind of selfless hero who pats himself on the back for daring to love a handicapped girl. He truly loves Sarah and wants to help her even though she doesn\u2019t want to be helped that way. It\u2019s easy to see why he\u2019d fall in love with Sarah. She\u2019s beautiful, intelligent and strong-minded. In one scene, she dances like it doesn\u2019t matter if anybody\u2019s watching. She doesn\u2019t give a f*** (that\u2019s how she\u2019d put it probably).<\/p>\n

\u00a0I absolutely LOVE Children of a Lesser God<\/strong>. It\u2019s an outstanding drama with doses of humor. The screenplay by Medoff and Hesper Anderson is well written. It strikes just the right balance of the two. Haines made a smart choice in casting non-hearing actors as students and a few others. You might recognize Linda Bove from Sesame Street as a successful deaf woman who Sarah admires. There are also some funny exchanges between Hurt\u2019s character and a hulking lad (Limnidis) who has a way with profane words. Music plays a significant role as James uses it as a learning aid. The scene where he leads his students in a dance and lip-sync number is especially well choreographed.<\/p>\n

\u00a0 Children of a Lesser God<\/strong> is what I call a quality film. It\u2019s gripping, intelligent, touching and beautiful. I\u2019m convinced it would have taken home Best Picture that year if it wasn\u2019t for Platoon. It too is a great film, but it\u2019s not one I can watch multiple times. I can do that with Children of a Lesser God<\/strong> though. It really is an excellent movie.\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Children of a Lesser God (1986)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Paramount\/Drama\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 118 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (language, sexual content, partial nudity)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Randa Haines\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Hesper Anderson and Mark Medoff\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Michael Convertino\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: John Seale \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Release date: October 3, 1986 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: William Hurt, Marlee Matlin, Piper Laurie, Philip Bosco, Allison Gompf, John F. Cleary, Philip Holmes, Georgia […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9311,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8967","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dramas"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/Children-of-a-Lesser-God-PI.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8967","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8967"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8967\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9313,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8967\/revisions\/9313"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9311"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8967"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8967"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8967"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}