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"Hollywood and Asperger's"

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conundrum
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10 Jan 2015, 7:59 pm

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alex-simo ... lp00000592


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Moviefan2k4
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11 Jan 2015, 2:49 am

I've never seen or heard of these films, but they sound interesting. I'm pretty hesitant to trust the opinions of anyone from the Huffington Post, though.


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Kraichgauer
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11 Jan 2015, 4:32 am

Moviefan2k4 wrote:
I've never seen or heard of these films, but they sound interesting. I'm pretty hesitant to trust the opinions of anyone from the Huffington Post, though.


I have heard of them, and have seen both Mozart And The Whale (which was filmed and set in my own home of the Spokane, Washington area), as well as Adam.
What's your beef with the Huff Post? I think they're pretty cool.


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SpirosD
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11 Jan 2015, 12:48 pm

I've seen all these films.
But the problem is how you show someone on screen with Asperger's without making them a stereotype? It's very hard.
The film Adam is kind of a stereotype, imagine Max from Parenthood grown up and there you have it, same stereotype.
My name is Khan is a great and amazing film, but again another stereotype.
Mozart and the whale is just crap, bad movie, so that one needs to be forgotten.
Temple Grandin, it's a bio, so it's based on facts and reality, Clair Danes gives an amazing performance, but compare her with the real Temple Grandin and you will also notice that she overacts a little to show her syndrome.
Little Man Tate, now that film is amazing, and I think really shows something else, there is not all the stereotype you usually find in other movies or shows, so unless you know it (or are an Aspie) the boy in the movie will not come out has being Autistic, and more me it's the most faithful interpretation of the syndrome.


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Kraichgauer
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11 Jan 2015, 3:58 pm

Forgot to mention that I have in fact seen Temple Grandin. Just saying...


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Tollorin
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11 Jan 2015, 6:13 pm

SpirosD wrote:
Little Man Tate, now that film is amazing, and I think really shows something else, there is not all the stereotype you usually find in other movies or shows, so unless you know it (or are an Aspie) the boy in the movie will not come out has being Autistic, and more me it's the most faithful interpretation of the syndrome.

How come Little Man Tate can count as a faithful interpretation of the syndrome? It show not a aspie boy but a profoundly gifted one. His isolement come from his intellect, not from a lack of theory of mind or anything like that. Giftedness, particulary extreme one like in Little Man Tate, may look like asperger (Social isolation, hypersensivity, special interests (More varied in the gifted case.) and so on...) but it's not. Of course, to complicate things the two can coexist.



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12 Jan 2015, 4:04 am

I've seen Adam and none of the others, but I did watch the trailers and, like SpirosD said, many of the characters look so stereotypical. Some of the characters seem a little bit more autistic than aspergers, like in My Name is Khan (but I won't judge too quickly) and Adam. Mozart and the Whale seems like a better representation. I hate that math/music prodigy thing with Little Man Tate and Mozart and the Whale. It's so overused and while it is true in many cases, I would rather film companies do some research and make a film in which we are not all the same (because we're not!).



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12 Jan 2015, 5:28 am

SpirosD wrote:
I've seen all these films.
But the problem is how you show someone on screen with Asperger's without making them a stereotype? It's very hard.
The film Adam is kind of a stereotype, imagine Max from Parenthood grown up and there you have it, same stereotype.
My name is Khan is a great and amazing film, but again another stereotype.
Mozart and the whale is just crap, bad movie, so that one needs to be forgotten.
Temple Grandin, it's a bio, so it's based on facts and reality, Clair Danes gives an amazing performance, but compare her with the real Temple Grandin and you will also notice that she overacts a little to show her syndrome.
Little Man Tate, now that film is amazing, and I think really shows something else, there is not all the stereotype you usually find in other movies or shows, so unless you know it (or are an Aspie) the boy in the movie will not come out has being Autistic, and more me it's the most faithful interpretation of the syndrome.


I've seen both Mozart and the Whale and Adam and agree with you that they are either about stereotypes or just plainly dull films. Would like to catch up at some point with My Name is Khan after your recommendation.
I think the best films about Asperger's are the ones where AS is incidental to the plot, that is, films with intricate plots where the AS element is understated. The audience should be left to their own devices to draw their own conclusion about the characters rather than the film makers assume that the audience are idiots and so present every thing in a simple fashion.



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18 Jan 2015, 11:47 pm

A side story in A Serious Man deals with the lead character's brother who clearly has Asperger's, and as the story is taking place decades ago, the brother's life is turned upside down when he's arrested for a gay liaison.


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mpe
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19 Jan 2015, 5:08 am

Moviefan2k4 wrote:
I've never seen or heard of these films, but they sound interesting. I'm pretty hesitant to trust the opinions of anyone from the Huffington Post, though.

Also not heard of any of them.
The one I'd think was the most obvious http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1568346/?ref_=nv_sr_1 isn't on the list. Or did Hollywood change the title character that much...



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21 Jan 2015, 10:42 am

Wow, I haven't even heard of these films, much less seen them. If there's one film that I think should be on this list, it's Mary and Max, an Australian claymation film. One of the titular characters, Max, is a 40+ year old man with Aspergers, and one of the few fictional characters I can relate to, even though I'm a young adult female with Aspergers. The movie's available on Netflix if you want to watch it, and I can link to the TVTropes page for it too. Here.

Seriously, just watch it and tell me that's not even a semi-realistic portrayal of Asperger's.


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