Life Animated

A Mind-Opening Film

A few days ago we had an opportunity to see “Life, Animated,” which opens around the country this weekend. Exquisitely crafted, this film introduces us to Owen Suskind: handsome (not unlike the young Oliver Sacks), kind, thoughtful and articulate, accomplished. Owen is also autistic–after years of silence in early childhood, he learned to speak again by embracing his passion for Disney animated characters. (You may remember the book and article by Owen’s father, eminent journalist Ron Suskind, which inspired the film.)

Watch the trailer, and please share it with your friends.

Here’s what the Washington Post had to say:

Viewers . . . will be grateful for the chance to spend time with Owen, a born leader who’s not only a delightful and memorable leading man, but who radically reframes conventional understanding of the autism spectrum. “Life, Animated” makes fascinating points, about the power of cinema, about meeting our loved ones where they are and, as Ron says, about who gets to decide what constitutes a meaningful life. That is a probing question — and “Life, Animated” provides a bracingly optimistic answer.

 

 

 

 

 

Twenty years ago, Oliver Sacks introduced Temple Grandin to a global audience in his book An Anthropologist on Mars, and since then we have seen so many exciting advances in the scientific understanding of the autism spectrum of conditions. More importantly, our culture is just beginning to embrace the many ways in which people with autism bring very special strengths to us all.

Life, Animated will enrich your life–please go to theaters this weekend to support this life-changing film. If you suffer from political convention overload, we guarantee it, this will make you proud to be a human again.