Sam's friends recommend that he hire Rita, a lawyer to help him get Lucy back. He shows up at her office and told her his story and after few days she offers to help him for free under the pressure of being seen by these women who gossip about her at work. she was supper annoyed with him at first but eventually starts to understand and be nicer to him what to say at court. Over the course of the trial, Sam helped Rita with her family problems and helps her to realize how much her son really means to her. Sam also convince her to leave her husband, because Rita told him that he cheated on her. While Rita works with Sam on helping on what to say at the court and to keep his parential right, chaos arises when Lucy convinces Sam to help her run away from the foster home she is being kept in during the trial. During the trial however, Sam breaks down, after being convinced that he is not capable of taking care of Lucy. They didn't put under concideration how the lose of her father would affect Lusy.
In the end, the foster family who planned on adopting Lucy lets Sam have custody of her because they realized that she has deep love for her father and couldn't live without him. Sam says that Lucy still needs a mother and asks if the foster mother would like to help raise Lucy. The movie ends with Lucy's being with her father, spending time with friends and Rita being divorced and renewing her relationship with her son.
The foster family decision to be supportive to him in the reunification is a best-case scenario for foster care-reunification with ongoing support from a family that has come to love the child. I love the collaboration relationship that developed by the end of the film. He also expresses one of his reasons for wanting to be reunified with Lucy: "Long term foster care is a bad idea because the foster parents don't know her. I know her, Lucy belongs with me". The foster family is also portrayed as an unrealistically high level of power, they are able to choose whether to adopt Lucy or whether to return her to Sam.
On the negative side, the film never explores Lucy's mother, and we never earn how Lucy feels about being abandoned, except that she asks once whether her mother will come back. Sam does try to find a motherly influence for Lucy.
Above all he had his love. He had a certain understanding of life that "normal" people don't have. He doesn't deny how different he is. But he also knowns how great he can be, and he would die for his love. On the book "Parenting and disability" Jean says disabled parents need to access support both formally and informally and how their children involvement in caring for their parents could change in life-course of a disabled parent.
We also see how judgmental society can be when it comes to developmental disabilities in this movie. People usually look at your capacity to think. But Sam in the movie showed us his struggle that ended in something we might label "unrealistic" and "incredible", that all of us are retards in one way or another. And it also showed us that sometimes it is your capacity to love that matters the most. Sometimes it is all it takes to win or keep living after you've lost.
I do believe there's the reward in parenthood that one looks for, and there's the suggestion to look differently on what beauty is and what suffering means. I also believe even before taking away a child from disabled parent, assessment of parenting capacity should be based on specific evidence rather than speculation.
Sam was born to live with the true quality of living. He had his daughter, who was everything he could never be, but who gave him an extra something to fight for, no matter how unqualified people may think you are, no matter how early or how late, to forgive the mistakes that are huge, and there's the suggestion to look differently on what beauty is and what suffering is.
Reference:
Jean, C 2003, 'Parenting and disability: Disabled parents' experiences of raising children (Book)', Family Matters, no. 65, pp. 76-77.
I felt sorry for Lucy. She never met her biological mother, separated from her autistic father, and being forced to go to foster care where her foster parents never cared about her. It’s so sad how things happen in real life where people don’t want to accept someone who is different including people with disability. One thing that kind of bothers me, seeing people like to pick on someone with a disability and calling them a “retard,” which is very disrespectful.
ReplyDelete-Kendra ZeMenye
I haven't seen the film but it sounds like it goes the route of self acceptance but defining what it means to be a "successful" disabled person through the lenses of able bodied as the norm/default position as it's answer to several aspects of Disability Theory we talked about towards the beginning of class. This seems to be a popular trend in many modern films that I hadn't really thought about until we learned about the theory.
ReplyDelete-Kenneth
For one of the first times since we have started these blog post, I am excited to actually have seen the movie I am commenting on! I Am Sam is a movie that I will never forget as it prompted a lot of emotion and empathy from me. I, too, also felt the negative connotation that is subliminally associated with "disabled" people. I feel that is what prompted so much emotion out of me as I am someone who aspires to stick for the marginalized. I feel that there should be movies that displays people who have "conditions" but their "conditions" do not define them and also shows their every day success'.
ReplyDelete-Kyra M.
I haven't seen this movie, but it definitely sounds emotional. I like the topics that it addresses, too. I think people with autism are seen as disabled and incapable, even though to a lot of people they just bring a different view of life. I think this movie presents a heartbreaking dilemma, and I don't think I have the right answer to it. On one hand I think it's important that the child is raised healthily by adequate parents that can show her different values in life including how to express emotions. However, it would be a shame for her to end up in the foster care system even though her biological dad wants her. It definitely sounds like an interesting movie and presents a topic that maybe we should think about a bit more.
ReplyDelete-Bailey West
Weini,
ReplyDeleteI, too, have not seen the film and deeply enjoyed your presentation of it. Your post gave me much to think about. One of them being that in our society we never associate disability with success. By contrast, disability is a stamp to society that one is incapable of taking care of themselves. On the contrary, there are many people with disabilities who are highly intelligent yet merely struggle with their social environment. While there are many disabilities, not all disabilities should be automatically labeled "incapable". I will now be spending my weekend trying to rent his film!
Thanks,
Aly Hernandez
Kathleen Paxtor:
ReplyDeleteI think it is interesting how people who were born or acquired a mental health problem always have to prove that they are enough; enough to work, parent, and sustain themselves. Yes maybe Sam could have used a little parental help but it sounds like he genuinely loved his daughter, which is what matters. She would be better off with a loving father than in a foster home that could’ve had abusive foster parents. Who are we to judge who is a good parent or not?