Assignment one
Rain man
“Rain Man’ is a movie about two lost brothers named Raymond and Charlie Babbitt. Raymond was the brother that suffered from an autistic savant syndrome. Charlie did not know he had a brother due to a very distant relationship with his father. During the movie his father dies and leaves Raymond a three million trust fund for his care in the institution, where he has spent most of his adult life. Charlie is left with his fathers rose bushes and his 1949 Buick Road master that ruined their relationship. Charlie and his girlfriend, Susanna, travel to Cincinnati, Ohio to track down who his father left his trust fund too. While Charlie is looking for the person that just inherited the three million. Raymond was outside
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This form of autism is a condition where the person demonstrates abilities in far in excess that would not be considered normal. “Savant syndrome is a condition in which a person with a mental disability, such as an autism spectrum disorder, demonstrates profound and prodigious capacities or abilities far in excess of what would be considered normal.” (Wikipedia) This condition is very rare in autistic patients. Savant syndrome occurs in developmental disabilities This condition is also caused from central nervous system injury or disease. There is one major skill with this syndrome and it is massive memory. I feel like the movie does represent this disability correctly. Raymond was very intelligent, he could remember what his dad would say to him word from word to word, when he would drive his dad’s car. Also Raymond could remember 6,000 books. He could name all the United States area codes and also remember how to get around from state to state, remembering all the roads. This shows his abilities that far exceed from normal. Raymond in the movie always read very quickly and understood every word like he was a scanning …show more content…
The dedication in the movie is Charlie always putting up with Raymond. Example when Raymond doesn’t follow his set schedule he freaks out. In one scene Raymond was talking about that it was time to watch The Peoples Court. At this part in the movie they were in a rural area. There was just corn and hills and nothing else, until they spotted a house. Charlie parked his car outside of the house and was knocking on the door to see if they could let him and Raymond to use their TV. As the time got closer and closer to the showing Raymond started to freak out more and more. The woman that was in the house finally opened the door and let them in. This shows how Charlie was dedicated to please Raymond because he did not want him to have a mental break down. What I also learned in the movie was about brotherly love. In the end Charlie did not get any money which what he wanted in the beginning. He gained a brother that he never knew he had, that was good enough for him. Charlie even wanted Raymond to live with him and not be in that institution. But deep down he knew that would not be good for Raymond that he needed to be there for the support he needed. In the last scene of the movie Raymond is boarding the train to take back to Cincinnati, and Charlie tells Raymond that he will come visit him in two weeks. At this scene it showed how much Charlie cared about Raymond and the couple days together they
He doesn’t lack of encourage anymore, he has overcome his fear and despair. “I have to go. I have to disobey every impulse and leave her for Jasper Jones, for Jack Lionel, for this horrible mess.” We see a different Charlie from his determination. From escape to face up, he shows us more responsible. From helpless to assertive, he comes to realize what he really wants. He knows the dark side of human nature and this unfair and cold world. His innocent, his perfect world has been destroyed by those horrible things; because of these, he knows the part of real world, he knows how the ‘dark’ actually changes this world, his friends, his family, included
What is Autism? It’s a developmental disorder that impairs one’s ability to communicate and interact with others. Christopher Boone from the novel A Curious Incident in the Nighttime and Temple Grandin, who has become one of the top scientists in the humane livestock handling industry both fall on the high-functioning spectrum of autism. Even so, they do not display the exact same traits and behaviors. Whereas Grandin thinks in pictures and employs this unique gift for practical use, Christopher thinks in patterns and fails communicate his talents with others. However, they both speak their mind and have trouble understanding facial expressions and emotions.
Not all autistic persons are savants. There are a few numbers of people who have the extraordinary skills of Raymond Babbitt. People with savant skills at the level of Raymond Babbitt are exceedingly rare (but they do exist). Finally, not all savants are autistic. While the frequency of savant syndrome is much lower among the mentally retarded than among autistics, mental retardation is a much more common condition. The point is while both are developmental disabilities; mental retardation and autism are separate conditions. There can be some similarities, and some mentally retarded persons can have some autistic features, but in general those two conditions require separate approaches. The savant abilities are grafted onto the basic autism or mental retardation, and savant syndrome exists as a special condition in either of those two disabilities.
The awareness of mental illnesses has slowly become greater over the years. We’re starting to hear more about them in the news. In schools, students are learning about and with people with mental disabilities. In our society, practically everyone has an idea of what some of the common disorders are (OCD, ADHD, etc). Therefore, it comes with no surprise that we see these mental disorders depicted in movies as well. The movie I decided to watch for this assignment was Rain Man starring Dustin Hoffman, Tom Cruise, and Valeria Golino. In this movie, the high-functioning autistic savant characteristics were depicted by Dustin Hoffman, whose character in the movie was Raymond Babbitt.
Exploring Autism in the Movie, Rain Man. Autism is considered a unique disorder that affects 1 in 500 people. Autism impairs three main areas of human development: speech. communication, and social interaction.
How many of us wished to have super powers as kids ? I don't mean being strong as hulk, being bitten by a spider to be able to climb buildings like spider man, or be able to fly like birds around the city in the blue sky's. It is known that the human brain can not focus on a single task more than 10%. But there have been some individuals that are capable of this ability. Daniel Tammet have learned one of the most strenuous languages on earth fluently in just 7 days from his interview or Stephen Wiltshire which was capable of drawing the New York city and Rome just by having an one time tour with the helicopter and flying around the city he was able to draw the whole city and mentioning all the details without captivating any pictures or writing any notes. Amazing right? Sadly these talents have their own cost. Most of these indivisible suffer in their daily lives not being able to communicate with others within verbal communication or emotionally, most of them can't even function in their daily lives by their own, dress by them self or even eat a simple lunch not even talking about preparing the food leaving them to intended to live their lives isolated from the society. This rare syndrome i'm talking about is recognized as the savant syndrome. it's an unique condition letting the persons have an intelligence above normal in some ares in life such as musical, mechanical, artistic and mathematical, in exchange of limiting this person emotionally. Savant syndrome touches several people in the world. It can occur after birth or later in any stage of life. It affects both males and females but occurs mostly in males. Many scientists have come with different explanations for the savant syndrome. First it was discovered in 1987 by J.London Down. Also, he was the one that devised and related the disorder with the skill to mention an amazing memory. A study published by Bernard Rimland have states that "the savant skills most often present in autistic people are those associated with right hemisphere functions and the most deficient abilities are associated with left hemisphere functions (Treffer, 2002). This supports prove that the left brain hemisphere model to be correct.
Charlie struggles with apparent mental illness throughout his letters, but he never explicitly addresses this problem. His friends make him realize that he is different and it is okay to be different from everyone else. This change in perspective gives Charlie new opportunities to experience life from a side he was unfamiliar with. Without these new friends, Charlie would have never dared to try on the things he has. His friends have helped him develop from an antisocial wallflower to an adventurous young man who is both brave and loyal. Transitioning shapes how the individual enters into the workforce, live independently and gain some control over their future
However in both works, Jacob and Raymond’s ability to love, to seeing things as they are and to sort out their priorities are being hampered by autism.
Raymond, or Rain Man, as Charlie affectionately called him as a child, definitely portrayed characteristics of autism spectrum disorder, as his perception and socialization with others was affected. Clearly, Raymond often engaged in repetitious behavior. An example of this is when he would go to a restaurant for breakfast with his brother Charlie. He predictably would state that he wanted pancakes, but would then say, “Of course the maple syrup is supposed
First, most parents and relatives do not know how to deal with this communication disorder. For instance, in the case of Raymond, he was normally left alone at home watching television (YouTube, 2012). His only companion at the time was Judge Wapner from the ‘People’s Court’ TV Show. Fortunately, these challenges were overcome. Although the film illustrates an autistic person in an emotional way that it may be difficult to form a bond, the people in his environment were still able to build a relationship. After interacting with him, Charlie develops a sense of brotherhood, which increases the feeling of love and compassion. Especially when he finds out that his imaginary friend Rain Man, who would sing to him when he was scared as a child is his older brother. Most importantly, Charlie develops personal change after interacting with his brother (YouTube, 2012). Similarly, the movie makes a significant achievement by inducing kind-heartedness and understanding towards these kinds of
Now Charlie is open to the possibilities that could happen in his life, ones again but this time with a healed heart and a confident soul. He is also thankful for all the love he has been revising from people around him. At the end of the Epilogue, Charlie finds a new perspective in life and has completely changes. He might not be a totally fixed person, he is a person who's full of scares but still willing to fight to find his happiness :
...aiting accurately depicts children with autism. From atypical development to intellectual functioning, the film was very accurate concerning the information found in Exceptional Lives. But much of the accuracy is due to the fact that many of the children were actual residents of the institute in which the film took place. Many of the students were actual children with autism. The director of the film desired to shed light on retardation, a subject often ignored or avoided in society of his time. The film, through Dr, Clark’s philosophy, argued that if an autistic child were ever to have a chance to learn self-reliance, pity and pampering cannot be tolerated. Though Dr. Clark’s methods were strict and somewhat controversial, he strongly desired to provide the opportunity for his students to be able to live fully. “The brain isn’t the whole of a being, Mr. Widdecombe.”
I believe that “What’s eating Gilbert Grape” gives a good portrayal of how someone with autism may act. In the movie “What’s eating Gilbert Grape”, Arnie is a 17 year old boy with some degree of autism. Since autism has such a broad spectrum, this movie does a good job showing how one specific person with autism may act. Throughout the entire movie the viewers can see that Arnie is different and doesn’t behave like a typical 17 year old. One big clue that Arnie has a developmental delay is in his speech. He has an underdeveloped vocabulary and very minimal grammar skills. According to the National Institutes of Health, “Some children with ASD may have delayed speech and language skills, may repeat phrases, and give unrelated answers to questions.” We can see these
...hat causes autism by labeling autism a “signal-processing” disorder with information reduction through compression (Fabricius 2010). Basically, compression is where the brain takes an image and remembers the basics of the image but not the fine details. Fabricius explained Savant Syndrome using the compression theory: that normal people work with a compressed image while Savants retain one hundred percent of the original details. This is known as the “Savant Hypothesis (Fabricius 2010).” For cognitively normal individuals, fine details are often lost in a process known as “prototyping.” When a cognitively normal individual sees an image, unimportant details-like, in Fabricius’ example, an embedded triangle- are lost. To the autistic Savant, those details stand out, and the Savant has trouble seeing the big picture. Below is the example from Fabricius’ work:
Therefore, there were no causal factors suggested in the film for the character’s disorder but it is generally accepted that it is caused by abnormalities in brain structure or function. Brain scans show differences in the shape and structure of the brain in children with autism compared to in neurotypical children. Researchers do not know the exact cause of autism but are investigating a number of theories, including the links between heredity, genetics, and medical problems (Autism Society)”. The movie was released in 1988 so during this time period there really wasn’t a lot known about this disorder. Towards the end of the movie, Charlie takes Raymond to a doctor in order to learn more about his condition and the doctor simply states that Raymond has autism and that, “there is really not much you can do for him other than to deal with it”. Raymond does not take any medication throughout the movie; so, the only treatment that he received, if any, is staying at the Walbrook mental Institute. If fact, members of the Walbrook Institute wanted to keep Raymond in order to learn more about him. The understanding of autism has come a long way since the release of this movie Rain Man. Some of the treatments today include medication, behavioral training and specialized therapy that includes speech, occupational, and physical therapy. “Early diagnosis and treatment help young children with autism develop to their full