"Mozart and the Whale" - Rubbish!

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I was at someones house over the weekend who had parts of the movie on his pc, and I have seen about half an hour of it. I hated it!! ! Everyone in it was like a stereo - type cartoon character of an aspie, like a human calculator math genius, a woman who takes every metaphor litereally, and a crazy woman who just recites facts about baseball in a robot voice. As someone who has met their fair share of autistic people myself I did not relate to it. I have no desire to see the rest at all.

I understand what you mean, I am no genius and I am sure that many Aspies in this forum are not geniuses either. Unlike in this movie, I don’t have a box of tricks to impress NTs with.

I do not sound like a Robot. I sound a lot like a Londoner, for a Canadian!

The industry has put out yet, another movie that portrays stereotypes about AS and autism.

I have read very mixed reviews, mostly positive about this movie. The sad thing about movies about minorities, is that we all want to own the movie. We want to see ourselves in it. I thought Rainman was great, breakthrough even . . . until I found out that my own son was autistic and knew immediately that the Spectrum is a really big place.
I have read quite a few reviews written by aspies and parents of autistics who really liked this movie and felt like it didn't stereotype. The clips I saw (just a few minutes) were of people that looked "normal" to me.
This is a huge problem with other minorities and it will be until there are more movies made by and written by those people who lived the story.

The film was inspired by the true life courtship between Jerry Newport and Mary Meindel, both are Aspie savants, Jerry is incredible in math and Mary is incredible in music. The characters were based off of them and how they met and all. Taking this fact into account, people are likely expecting way too much out of something that was only meant as a portrayl of a courtship between one Aspie couple.

If they made a movie based on my life, it would have no plot and no characters, and the hero would always lose.

Some stunning visuals and a few good action scenes, though.

I see the movie as a compilation of almost all aspie traits I have identified. Of course they exaggerated the behaviors, but what did you expect? If they made a movie about aspies who manage to look normal, it would look like a movie full of normal people, and there's plenty of those already. I think this movie was a great gift to us all, especially considering it didn't make enough money to cover it's budget. If you don't see yourself in this movie, maybe it's because you haven't realized how weird you actually look from the outside.

:peace:

Thanx. That'll be good for my social paranoia.

I mostly agree with this. You can call it "stereo typing", but the fact is, if the movie was too subtle nobody would understand the differences.

I hesitate to comment on this post as I have yet to see the film. However, the traits mentioned are the expectations of the general viewing public. A true reflection of an AS individual would be awkward and confusing for the public. If a movie could accurately portray the thought processes of an AS individual, the NT possibly viewing it (if he/she understood the context) would potentially feel rather uncomfortable. While Hollywood often loses money on a project, they would never do so intentionally.

I personally thought the show presented a fairly large cross-section of different individuals. Of course, it is impossible to show characters to identify with every individual autistic out there, and to expect that would be ludicrous, as there are as many individuals as there are autistics. A couple were portrayed according to stereotypical views, but they were all individual characters. One of it's purposes was to show that autistics are varied individuals, and that they don't all fit the Rainman stereotype. I thought it succeeded fairly well. Remember, that most of the public out there are familiar with the "autistic" stereotypes of Rainman, and that kid on Mercury Rising. I think it will get the point across.
Personally, I identified with Bronwyn.

I haven't seen myself in the movie, because I haven't seen the movie!! !... this is one big disadvantage of living in a country so far from Hollywood, I don't think I'll see it in theaters here, or even in dvd... I hope somewhere around the Internet this thing appears so I can see it...

About the sterotypes... those stereotypes exist because people often take what the see in tv or movies and take it as the whole and only truth. They could have taken the story of a very rich and successful aspie, for example; and we'd be saying that not all of us are rich and geniouses, but if they take an aspie person that lives his life around a dayjob and talking about Oprah, thare would be a lot of people jumping and saying we're capable of more than that... that's part of life, I think every person in this world falls into a certain sterotype. Every person is a part of a minority, a vulnerable or "special" group of people, there is nobody completely average in this world...

I was not crazy about this film either. My main problem was with Isabelle. Why did the female protagonist have to be the prettiest one? And, she was cruel to Donald, jerked him around. She didn't seem aspie at all, either.

As far as the stereotyped individuals in the support group, I found them very interesting, and I saw myself in the darkhaired lady who kept glowering about the world and pointing out all the terrible things that could happen to people. And I have known people like the literature-obsessed guy and the weather-obsessed guy (who was only on screen for a few seconds!). I would have preferred to see a romance between the weather-obsessed guy and one of the other females. It would have made for a better film.

It hasn't even been released (except for a limited number of theatres near where it was filmed) in the states yet. I got my DVD from New Zealand.

Since the movie was based on a real couple - the important factor should be whether THEY feel like they were stereotyped. Otherwise if it is an accurate portrayal and seems overdone or cartoonish that is a perception issue about allowing Aspies/auties to be themselves. Sort of like no one wanting a black person to be shown in a stereotypical role shining shoes. Well if the movie was biographical/autobiographical about a black man who shined shoes than it would be silly to give him another profession because no one wanted to show sterotypes. All groups of people have certain stereotypes - some positive, some negative. I have not seen the movie either or even really read the reviews so I don't know how the people who were supposed to be represented feel about it.

I got mine from Australia. When it does come to DVD over here, I'm getting it.