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(The following review was requested by Bill, a Titans fan so devoted, he moved to Nashville. How fitting.)

Football, more than any other sport, is a religion. There are scheduled weekly worship services (for at least 16 weeks out of the year). There is ceremonial wardrobe, chanting and singing, and there is shared joy and suffering.

And as with any church, there are true believers, those whose existence feels incomplete, without touching their religion in some way. Paul (Patton Oswalt) is Big Fan.

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In the interest of full disclosure, I feel obligated to share something with you before we get to my review of Sandra Bullock’s latest blockbuster money-grab, The Blind Side.

I really, really like Sandra Bullock.

Okay, those of you still reading, let me go a bit deeper. I really like Sandra Bullock, though I’m certainly not a fan of a huge number of her movies. (Forces of Nature, anyone?) But throughout her career, I’ve seen things in many of her performances that made me think there was more to her than disposable romantic comedies. In Crash, a movie that I’d sooner piss on than watch again, I thought she was one of the more authentic characters on the screen. So when I heard she was making a more drama-driven piece, a sports movie of all things, I figured I might give it a watch.

Then I saw the trailers for The Blind Side.

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