juliette lewis – A Is For Aoife Not Autism

Greetings Earthlings! 🙂

This week I’d like to talk about the depiction of autism in the 1999 romantic comedy film ‘The Other Sister‘, starring Juliette Lewis and Diane Keaton.

Fun fact– Juliette Lewis also appeared in another film featuring an autistic character, ‘What’s Eating Gilbert Grape.’

So what’s the film about?

The film centres around mildly mentally disabled Carla Tate who has lived a sheltered life in a private school. Upon graduation, she returns home to her overprotective mother determined to earn a diploma from a local technical university so that she can become a veterinary assistant and establish her independence. Whilst at college, she meets and falls in love with Danny (who is also mentally disabled), and seeing his independent life, she further advocates for her own life and an apartment, much to the chagrin of her oftentimes controlling mother.

While autism is never explicitly mentioned, both Carla and Danny display a number of autistic traits such as coordination issues, impulsivity, fondness for routine, specialist interests, food issues and lack of filter in social settings.

You can see a trailer for the film bel0w:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGlc0FxRjbM

So what did I make of it?

As a story, I enjoyed it. It was a wholesome romantic comedy that broke the mould at the time by featuring a mentally disabled couple at it’s core, showing that neurodivergents, despite our differences, want to have ordinary romantic relationships like everyone else. However, the film largely received negative views for the acting (Juliette Lewis was nominated for a Razzie for her performance) and shameless use of disability as a gimmick.

In terms of autism, this was a fairly run of the mill affair, standard stereotypical traits, but unlike the critics I found their depiction fairly inoffensive compared with other more stereotyped examples.

All in all, while not the most relatable depiction of autism when compared with other romantic movies featuring autistic couples (like ‘Mozart and the Whale‘), the film is still worth a watch 🙂

Hope you enjoyed this post dear Earthlings!

Have a lovely weekend! 🙂

Aoife

Greetings Earthlings! 🙂

This week I’d like to discuss the portrayal of autism in the 1993 comedy-drama film ‘What’s Eating Gilbert Grape‘ starring Johnny Depp, a young Leonardo Dicaprio and Juliette Lewis (who ironically portrayed an autistic character in ‘The Other Sister‘ a few years later).

download (1).jpg

The story follows Gilbert Grape (Depp) a young man living in a rural town in Iowa as he takes care of his obese mother and autistic brother Arnie (Dicaprio). The film explores Gilbert’s life and struggles to take care of his family whilst trying to forge a life of his own.

If you haven’t seen this classic, here’s the trailer:

So how does the film fare in it’s depiction of autism?

Autism is not explicitly mentioned as such in this film, but most experts agree that Arnie’s traits align with those of autism. His repetitive movements, echolalia, self injurious behaviours, use of atypical speech, preference for routine, his childlike nature, mind-blindness and lack of danger perception (he has a fondness for climbing the town water tower) all indicate that Arnie is on the spectrum. This is also one of the few films where the autist is not portrayed as a savant so that’s a refreshing change!

Leonardo Dicaprio’s acting is, as always, sublime- he even received his first ever Academy Award nomination for his portrayal of Arnie in this role. In particular I felt that the depiction of meltdowns was quite good, however, the most striking aspect of the film, as in Atypical, was how it highlights the struggles that the wider family often experiences with autism, particularly where siblings are concerned. Gilbert loves Arnie dearly, but taking care of him and his entire family takes it’s toll.

The film also takes a more lighthearted approach at times to Arnie’s eccentricities. Arnie’s lack of filter delivers some of the more humorous moments in the film, which like Atypical, allows us to see the funnier side of autism- yes autism can be challenging, but it’s not all doom and gloom.

All in all ‘What’s Eating Gilbert Grape‘ gives a fairly decent representation of autism, but either way- the film is worth a watch just for Leonardo Dicaprio’s performance. This film really was a sign of things to come for him! 🙂

Image result for what's eating gilbert grape

Hope you enjoyed this post dear Earthlings! 😀

Enjoy the weekend!

Aoife

Tag: juliette lewis

Autism in ‘The Other Sister’

Autism on Screen- What’s Eating Gilbert Grape

A Is For Aoife Not Autism