If I'm watching a film about two unlikable people that the script is desperate to put together, you can forgive me for not being too enthusiastic. In Children Of A Lesser God there's a teacher called James with an 'unconventional' style of doing things (When are we going to see a NORMAL educator doing NORMAL things?) That 'SURPRISE SURPRISE' work on his unruly class. He's just started at a school for the deaf you see, and in true Dead Poet's Society style, is the only live wire in a sea of formality. This part of the movie, as derivative as it is, is at least interesting.Then we meet the love interest Sarah, played by Oscar winner Marlee Matlin. She's 25, a former student there who's stayed on as a cleaner. For some reason, James starts to unabashedly stalk her and won't take "NO" for an answer when propositioning her for a date. She eventually gives in (Perhaps to just shut him up) and 'SHOCK HORROR' her emotions turn from dislike to l'amour almost in the space of one dinner.Another thing to note about her is her DARK AND TROUBLED PAST which shows itself in random screaming fits that arise for no particular reason. Yeah, she's had it bad... But flying off the handle at the slightest indiscretion didn't endear her to me one bit. So, you have the creepy stalker teacher who's OH SO WILD & WACKY on one hand, and the unstable deaf girl who takes offense at virtually everything on the other. Am I supposed to root for these irritating boors? No dice.I'll say one thing for them, though... They TRULY belong together. 5/10

The four main characters of Children of a Lesser God include James Leeds, Sarah Norman, Dr. Franklin, and Sarah's mother. The main characters of the film represent competing viewpoints of how Deafness is viewed by the public.James, portrayed by actor William Hurt, is an impassioned speech teacher at the school for the Deaf. He is creative in the classroom, a visionary, and an innovator who thinks outside the box. James has had a long string of short-term jobs which suggest to me that his head-in-the- clouds idealism clashed with the more pragmatic views held by previous administrators. To me, James represents my Deaf ed cohorts and me who maybe sometimes romanticize the field of education and our students and risk falling into the trap of appearing to be paternalistic towards our students despite our best intentions. Our hearts are in the right place, but sometimes we need to have our bubbles burst and brought back to reality.Sarah Norman, portrayed by Marlee Matlin (who is Deaf in real life), is a former student of the school where she now works as a custodian, despite her intellectual gifts. To me, Sarah represents the Deaf culture at large in that they're sometimes misunderstood by the hearing world. Sarah comes across as rebellious and angry, yet in actuality, she is hurt by the humiliation and isolation she has suffered at the hands of a few ignorant hearing people.Dr. Franklin, played by Philip Bosco, is the administrator of the school. He represents the "old-school" mentality of a practical and realistic education for the Deaf. In his eyes, Sarah is successful in that she has a job and is paying taxes. This is not to say that Dr. Franklin is a villain. He obviously cares about his students; he just doesn't see them as equals to hearing people. To give an example of his mindset, note how he contrasts his philosophy to that of James'. Dr. Frankin talking to James: "I'm sure you do have a lot of energy and a lot of new ideas. I did too when...But nobody's trying to change the world around here. Just trying to help a few deaf kids get along a little better. But that's all. Everything else is razzle-dazzle. Am I making myself clear?" Actress Piper Laurie plays Sarah's mother. She represents the families of Deaf children who struggle to put away their feelings of loss and disappointment after having a "disabled" child. Since Sarah's mother never learned to sign fluently, the miscommunication and misunderstandings between mother and child were inevitable.Four scenes come to mind when considering cultural and social dynamics of the movie Children of a Lesser God. One scene that points to the isolation sometimes felt by Deaf people in a hearing world was the dinner party where James is in the minority because the party goers are all Deaf or hearing people heavily involved in the Deaf community. Even though James is a user of sign language, his fluency is an issue and the participants are employing American Sign Language. His discomfort and feelings of exclusion are palpable. What is telling is that I don't believe James realized that the emotions he was feeling were the same feelings that kept Sarah from venturing into the world outside the school for the Deaf.Another scene that struck me was when James and Sarah were at a restaurant dancing as they communicated through sign language. There was another couple dancing nearby who couldn't keep their eyes off James and Sarah. The look on the couple's faces wasn't that of curiosity or fascination, but of morbid curiosity. It reminded me of people who rudely stare at amputees or those with physical "deformities."A third scene that pointed to the cultural and social dynamics between the hearing and Deaf worlds is when James brought Sarah to a poker party hosted by his hearing colleagues. Sarah had taken it upon herself to learn the rules of poker in order to fit in. Among his friends, James got all the credit for "training" her. Sarah caught on at the end of the party and was understandably hurt and annoyed by being likened to a trained dog.The fourth scene that called attention to the gulf between the hearing and Deaf worlds was when Sarah asked James to explain what music sounded like. He tried, but couldn't find the signs or even the words to explain the emotional power of music to a Deaf person. James' frustration at Sarah for not being able to hear the sounds he loved and Sarah's frustration for not being able to share in James' love of music created a fissure in the burgeoning relationship of the Deaf-Hearing couple.The main theme of the movie Children of a Lesser God is that love, good intentions, or government regulations can't easily bridge the abyss separating two cultures divided by history, maltreatment, and exploitation of the minority culture by the majority. You notice I said intervention can't easily bridge the gap. All of these things – love, good intentions, government involvement – can and have improved the lives of Deaf people and other disadvantaged groups, but it has taken time. The movie is about two ordinary people trying to overcome suspicion, bitterness, misunderstanding, and cultural missteps in order to find a common ground to explore their love. As James asked Sarah: "Do you think there's someplace where we can meet that's not in silence and not in sound?" This film remains one of my favorite movies and was the inspiration for my choice of avocation. Although some conventions that the movie uses, such as William Hurt orally interpreting Marlee Matlin's signs during private conversations, are sometimes grating, it is better than using subtitles. The movie is a good starting point for hearing individuals to develop an understanding of the complex hurdles that Deaf people must overcome.

Two is more than one. Three is more than two ; etc., ad lib. Such is the mathematics of director Haines' dramaturgical use of clichés in "Children of a Lesser God", an agreeable but insignificant romantic dramedy that pretends to be more grave than it is. Marlee Matlin - looking beautiful and acting convincingly - presents one of the strongest elements here ; others are Canada in autumn and Bach's strings. Yet the director with her screenwriters and cast (especially John Hurt in the lead) seem to be concerned more about (American mainstream) audience than about the deaf. That's why they often confuse realism and sentimentality ; their urge to translate every single sign language "speech", too, results in a disputable compromise with reality. More discerning viewers would likely prefer some tougher, enduring bite, for example the documentary "Land des Schweigens und der Dunkelheit", in which the German director Werner Herzog makes (almost) no compromises at all.

Boy meets girl; boy (unfairly) loses girl; and after assorted trials and tribulations the two are blissfully reunited. The standard romantic formula hasn't changed, but here it benefits from a unique perspective: he can hear, she can't. William Hurt is the overconfident teacher of deaf students trying to convince Marlee Matlin (against her better judgment) that silence isn't golden, and the tensions of attraction between them make for an often absorbing romantic drama. Oddly enough the film, so otherwise sympathetic to the needs of the hearing impaired, is top heavy with verbal rather than visual expression. Notable exceptions (disregarding the obvious aquatic sex sequence: only in a movie can people undress with such ease and grace underwater) include the scene in which Hurt becomes the odd man out at a party conducted in sign language, and a later moment when he unwinds to the music of Bach while Matlin site alone and oblivious in the background. Considering the logistical problems of the scenario (for example how to communicate to an uneducated audience a conversation held entirely in sign language) the film is nevertheless an uncomplicated tearjerker that hides its stage origins well. The partially deaf Matlin is impressive in her debut, while Hurt performs like an actor self-consciously aware of the camera's presence, affecting an artificial naturalness which he drops only during the more fiery lover's quarrels, when the couple shows just how passionate and expressive hands and faces can be.