A Child is Waiting - A Critical Review

To view this film, click here to go to a YouTube playlist that has segmented the film into 13 clips. Film Synopsis John Cassavetes 1963 film, A Child is Waiting, presents a thought-provoking story based on the institutionalisation of children with special needs. The film centres around a 12-year-old boy named Reuben Widdicombe. Although Reuben is primarily portrayed as having an intellectual disability (as evidenced through medical examinations deeming him defective), he also demonstrates some autistic characteristics relating to the triad of impairments. For example, he has impaired communication, significant issues relating to others and there are a few scenes which allude to repetitive behaviours and restricted interests. Although the term autism is never used in relation to Reuben, this omission may well be related to the films era. Despite autism being coined and defined by Kanner as early as 1943, it was not included as a separate diagnostic category of the DSM until the third version was released in 1980. Subsequently, given that the film was released in 1963, it is understandable that the term autism was avoided. The film begins with a traumatic scene involving Reuben being dropped off at the Crawthorne Training School an institution for children with intellectual disabilities. Reuben is tempted out of his fathers car by the schools director, Dr. Matthew Clark (Burt Lancaster), who offers him a toy car to ride in. As Reuben starts riding around in the toy car, his anxious father covertly returns to his car, and tears off, leaving Reuben screaming in fear, anger and confusion at the disappearing vehicle. This is obviously seen as an act of betrayal by Reuben, as it seems to taint his relationship with Dr. Clark for the rest of the film and causes him to reject institutional life and withdraw from social and academic engagement. In fact at one point Dr. Clark even refers to him as one of the institutions most spectacular failures. This changes, however, on the arrival of Jean Hansen (Judy Garland) a failed musician who has come to teach at Crawthorne in an attempt to find some kind of meaning in her life. Hansens first encounter with Reuben involves him pushing through a throng of clamouring students to introduce himself with desperate, garbled cries of, My name is Reuben Widdicombe. My name is Reuben Widdicombe. My name is Reuben Widdicombe, leaving Hansen with a puzzled and intriguing first impression. As the film progresses, Hansens relationship with Reuben becomes deeper, and she finds herself becoming a strong advocate for him. This causes her to clash with Dr. Clark and his methods which, to her, seem heavy-handed and uncaring. This conflict comes to a head when Hansen, who is appalled by the fact that Reubens parents never visit him, ignores Dr. Clarks instructions and contacts Reubens parents. A series of events spiral from this act until a resolution is finally reached at the institutions Thanksgiving pageant, which Hansen has organised. This culminating event a touching scene in which the institutions children perform a play for their parents prompts both acceptance from Reubens father, as well as Hansen and Clark developing a mutual respect for each others approaches to the education of students with special needs. An Educational Perspective A Child is Waiting is a unique and powerful film that was released in a vibrant disability rights era. The film was released in the same year that the American government passed the Mental Retardation and Community Mental Health Centers Construction Act of 1963 a move which ultimately resulted in deinstitutionalisation however the Education for All Handicapped Children Act was still another 12

years off (Rehabilitation Research & Training Center on Independent Living Management, 2002). Needless to say, the film reflects this shifting cultural mindset as it puts forward a variety of competing beliefs and values about the care and education of children with disabilities. This is done by immersing the audience in the disability milieu and exposing them to passionate dialogue that reflects the wide range of issues encountered by educators, parents, students and government officials. Although some aspects of the film are of its time for example, at one point the children are categorised as the educable, the trainable and the totally dependent the films inherent advocacy for the rights of children with disabilities to an education is ahead of its time. This advocacy is evident in Dr. Clarks ethos that we have to accept these children as they are, just as they are. Their life has meaning, it has purpose but is also supported by various events throughout the film, including regular scenes involving students (who were actual students with disabilities attending an institution at the time) participating in educational situations not unlike those experienced by mainstream children (although, unfortunately, it does utilise the dreaded basket-weaving activity that has, over time, become a negative term associated with people with intellectual disabilities). Despite the theme of education for all resonating strongly throughout the film, it has to push its way through the noise of competing voices, and by the end of the film the audience is made acutely aware of the myriad of issues relating to disability at the time. On one hand, there is Reubens father, who makes a decision at one point to remove Reuben from the institution and instead invest in personal care for him, stating that what he needs is someone to take care of him. Someone to look after him and see that he has everything he wants. And doesnt have to do anything he doesnt want to do. Alternatively, there is the government official who visits the school to assess it for funding, and who wants to know how many children could lead normal lives before revealing his personal prejudice that hed rather give every penny we spend on these children to training exceptionally bright children on the outside - children who might become the scientists and contributors of tomorrow. In contrast with these voices is Dr. Clark, with his high expectations of student achievement, but who steadfastly believes that students with disabilities should be kept in an institution in order to avoid being sheltered by their families. At one point, he comments on the mistakes made by Reubens parents in their early efforts with Reuben: His parents didnt face the fact that he was retarded until very, very late. They let him play with ordinary children. They sent him to kindergarten. If you can imagine what kind of an experience it must have been for a boy like Reuben to go to kindergarten. Then they decided the thing to do was to hide him, to hide him from everything. To protect him, to protect him from the world, protect him from himself. Shortly after this spiel, in one of the films most poignant moments, Dr. Clark takes Hansen to an adult institution to show her the result of this sheltering to demonstrate his point, and the pair are shown walking through a room (in an actual institution, using actual people with disabilities) filled with adult males playing with toy cars and attempting to eat rubber balls as if they were apples. Although modern eyes would critique Clarks non-inclusive approach, when the film is viewed in its historical context, this in-your-face scene is a powerful argument for Clarks case. An interesting dichotomy within the film is that on one hand, the children with disabilities are celebrated for their unique abilities and are portrayed as being entirely capable of participating fully in life. Yet, on the other hand, there is this notion that this can only be achieved by shutting them up in specialised training schools. Whether or not this ideological conflict was achieved on purpose or by luck is debatable, as it may have simply been the by-product of a troubled production process. During production, the films producer, Stanley Kramer, re-edited the work of director John Cassavetes, resulting in a clash of ideologies that is evident in the film. It would be interesting to have seen how ground-breaking the original unedited Cassavetes version would have been, given his later commentary (cited in Carney, 2001, p. 123): The difference in the two versions is that Stanley's picture said that retarded children belong in institutions and the picture I shot said retarded children are better in their own way than supposedly healthy adults. The philosophy of his film was that retarded children are separate and alone and therefore should be in institutions with others of their kind. My film said that retarded children could be

anywhere, anytime, and that the problem is that we're a bunch of dopes, that it's our problem more than the kids'. The point of the original picture that we made was that there was no fault, that there was nothing wrong with these children except that their mentality was lower. A Disability Perspective The beauty of this film is that its focus on the disability milieu and its associated debates means that it doesnt have to rely on stereotypical disability portrayal to propel the plot a criticism often levelled at many films involving characters with disabilities. Instead, the film presents an array of characters with disabilities, all with their own unique talents and challenges. There are a number of common criticisms regarding cinematic portrayals of disability, some of which are directed specifically at portrayals of autism. These invariably revolve around the use of sensationalised representations of autistic traits such as echolalia or savant abilities (Safran, 1998a; Baker, 2008) that ultimately result in a one-dimensional portrait of the autist (Osteen, 2008, p. 31). According to Baker, autism is a viable plot device and autistic characters are viable characters only if a spectacular skill or power is among the characters defining traits (Baker, 2008, p. 234). This observation refers to representations such as those found in Rain Man (1988), where Raymond Babbit (Dustin Hoffman) possesses superhuman mathematical abilities, or Silent Fall (1994) in which a central characters echolalia is exploited as a narrative device (Osteen, 2008). Such portrayals are problematic, as they only value the contributions of people with disabilities when they are exceptional, and do not reflect the day-to-day reality of most disabled people (Shapiro, 1994, p. 17). However, A Child is Waiting is a unique film in that it seems to avoid these stereotypical portrayals of people with disabilities. In fact, it challenges perceptions about the abilities of people with intellectual impairments. In many ways, it succeeds where more modern films have failed. Rather than utilising autistic traits as plot devices, or focussing on exceptional aspects of the disorder, the film simply presents Reuben as is, and instead constructs a thought-provoking representation of his milieu around him. The film also utilises actual students with disabilities in its cast a move that is unusual even by todays standards. Although some might argue that the inclusion of these actors is simply a tokenistic effort that is simply exploiting them as curios or to create a certain atmosphere (Barnes, 2003), this is a blinkered view. There are many scenes in which Hansen or Clark are directly interacting with the children in a variety of educational activities and the audience is presented with very real representations of students with disabilities in everyday life. These accurate representations make the film a powerful tool for education about students with disabilities. Given that films can be a major source of information about disabilities, particularly for people who have minimal contact with people with impairments (Safran, 1998b) it is vital that these characters are depicted realistically and positively, such as those in A Child is Waiting. By utilising actors with disabilities in these roles, it provides the audience with an opportunity for sanctioned staring (Hall & Minnes, 1999) which can help to deconstruct misconceptions. The Final Word A Child is Waiting is a powerful film that not only reflects the disability debates of its era, but goes a step ahead and promotes the idea of education as a right for all. Its presentation of a variety of passionate and varied voices from within the disability milieu contributes to this being an extremely thought-provoking film that challenges the audiences perceptions of equality. Additionally, the use of actual children with disabilities in its cast, combined with accurate portrayals of day-to-day life ensure that A Child is Waiting provides audiences with a realistic glimpse into the world of disability. REFERENCES Baker, A. D. (2008). Recognising Jake: Contending with formulaic and spectacularised representations of Autism in film. In M. Osteen (Ed.), Autism and representation, (pp. 229-243). New York: Routledge.

Barnes, C. (1992). Disabling imagery and the media: An exploration of the principles for media representations of disabled people. Halifax: Ryburn Publishing. Carney, R. (2001). Cassavetes on Cassavetes. London: Faber and Faber Limited. Kramer, S.(Producer), & Cassavetes, J (Director). (1963). A Child is Waiting [Motion picture]. U.S: Stanley Kramer Productions. Osteen, M. (2008). Autism and representation. New York: Routledge. Rehabilitation Research & Training Center on Independent Living Management. (2002). Disability history timeline. Retrieved on 28th September, 2009, from http://isc.temple.edu/neighbor/ds/disabilityrightstimeline.htm Safran, S. P. (1998a). The first century of disability portrayal in film: An analysis of the literature. The Journal of Special Education, 31(4), 467 -478. Safran, S. P. (1998b). Disability portrayal in film: Reflecting the past, directing the future. Exceptional Children, 64(2), 227-238. Shapiro, J. P. (1994). No pity. New York: Random House.