Blind movie critic sees things differently

Jay and Dorothy Forry at the movies

April 19, 2001
Web posted at: 3:19 PM EDT (1919 GMT)

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From Neal Broffman
CNN

TAMPA, Florida (CNN) -- Movie critic Jay Forry can't watch the films he reviews, but it doesn't mean he doesn't enjoy them. He's listening closely.

"A lot of people say you go blind and your hearing gets better," said Forry, who lost his eyesight in 1987 to diabetes. "That's not it -- you just tend to use it a lot more. I'm listening for a good story line; if you don't have a good story line you don't have a movie."

With the assistance of his wife, Dorothy, who narrates the on-screen action and gives detailed scene descriptions at the theater, Forry writes movie reviews with a comic twist that run in several newspapers and air on 23 radio stations in the United States and Canada.

In a recent review of the thriller "The Gift," starring Keanu Reeves and Kate Blanchett, Forry said: "My only downfall in the movie is it's a little predictable. In fact, it is so predictable, even I knew what was coming up."

His jokes about blindness may offend some, Forry said, but he just calls his ability to laugh at himself a positive attitude. Even his rating system taps into his self-deprecating sense of humor: "A -- So good, blind people like it" to "F -- Blindness was a blessing."

Forry provides movie reviews to several radio stations

Forry trusts his wife to rein in his comments, he said.

"You have to be real careful that people receive it as humor and not a slap," Dorothy Forry said. "He doesn't mean it that way."

Forry didn't become a movie critic until after he lost his eyesight.

Diagnosed with diabetes nearly 30 years ago, Forry developed blindness from the disease several years later. He subsequently lost his job as a construction foreman and went back to college for training in a new field.

While there, he suggested he write a movie column for the campus newspaper -- as a joke -- but his column became established at his Florida school. His new career path was set.

Now, boasting his position as "the nation's only blind movie critic," on his Web site, Blindside Reviews, Forry said her hopes to offer insights into the latest cinema releases -- and a few laughs along the way.

Blindside Reviews

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