A movie on a group of minority who deserves the same love and care like all of us. It helps us to look at life from a different perspective. With lots of sincerity and excellent use of camera to mimic their world. Before I went I thought it would talk about massage but it is a group drama to tell the love and lust of blind people. It cleverly uses some scenes to tell the advantage and/or disadvantages of being blind while basically telling us what life is like for a blind masseur – which is probably the same as a seeing person.
Since I have not read the original novel, I would not know the detailed background of each character. But for a movie, it seems there are a lot of story lines going on and the only thing that links them together is that they all work for a massage parlor in Nanjing. It would have been nice if more time would dedicate deeply into the main characters and their relations with each other.
I am glad I went to Dialogue in the Dark and experienced what it would be like to be blind – once your vision is lost, your other senses such as hearing, smelling, touching and tasting become sharper. You will probably have better memory and you may even "look" at the world more clearly.
Hence what the main stream considers beautiful may not matter much to a blind person. On the contrary, self-respect, is more important. The director cleverly uses the flirting scene and crying alone scene which highlights the shortcomings in the world of the visually impaired. However, during a black out, it is the blind who helps the others to safety.
Similar to the mainstream world, blind people love, have desires and dignity. They also deserve to be treated as such.
