Confession: Though I write about the movies professionally, I avoided seeing the film CODA until a few hours before the Oscar ceremony where it won the top prize—when I finally booted up Apple TV Plus and sat down with my wife and kids. From the moment I heard about this tale of a working-class family with two deaf parents, a deaf son, and a hearing daughter, it seemed like the kind of movie that demanded you like it or be accused of being mean to a disabled person. And I can’t stand that kind of emotional cultural blackmail. I’ll bet there are a lot of people like me who saw or read about CODA and thought, "Well, that’s like a virtue-signaling homework assignment, and I have something better to do with my time."
As it turns out, you don’t. CODA is a wonderful, wonderful, wonderful...