Film about autism and MMR

[Jimjams]

On Dec 15 on channel 5 there is a film about autism and the MMR. it's called Hear the Silence. Apparently -even if you;re not enamoured with the MMR storyline- its a pretty accurate portrayal of life with autism in the family (oh heck!) I've seen the word "harrowing" used. Apparently you need lots of hankies. My friend's (from email) son is in it. 4 years ago they said he wouldn't ever talk and now he's been in a film- absolutely amazing. i can't wait to see it. MrsF - remind me please :-)

The woman from truly madly deeply is in it as well- she plays my friend's son's mum.

Agree Jimjams that it means more to me to see autism. I saw a documentary about JFK the other day and it was saying how biased and inaccurate Oliver Stone's film was, then there's Braveheart!

have you ladies read "the curious incident of the dog in the night-time" by mark haddon? i really liked the book - but i was wondering how realistic the portrayal of autism was. clearly the condition is a spectrum - christopher in the book is clearly high functioning (hope that isn't one of those irritating terms - i'm sure you will put me straight if so).

thanks.

Doncha you just get fed up of people such as these 'senior doctors' patronising Joe Public?? It smacks of 'nanny knows best, we're the experts, you're just the little people, what would you understand??' It really gets my goat.

I read an interview with Julia Stevenson in last weekend's paper. I felt like this isn't just another role to her, she really has an interest in the subject.

I've just been lent the 'Curious Incident etc' and am looking forward to reading it.

well curious incident- is a great book- but nothing like my son. I'm sure its a good representation of AS though (high funtioning is fine as a term btw!).

I get kind fed up of the "feel good" portrayal of autism- so I'm looking forward to this - which is meant to be realistic.

Good point suedomim. The last MMR televised debate I saw a senior dr's argument came down to "oh these mother's who think their child has become autistic following the MMR ho ho ho, they just hadn't noticed beforehand". Patronising git (and he did use the term "these mothers" as well). Who do i believe? Now let me see mother who's seen her child every day since he\she was born, or arrogant consultant who knows that MMR is safe so doesn't need to listen to silly mother.

Having had it happen to me ("don't be ridiculous of course your child hasn't go verbal dyspraxia they're not trying to talk at all you're just imagining it" (and yes I was told that). Ammended a year later to "oh your child has verbal dyspraxia but they're too difficult to treat" And consultants wonder why they have a reputation of being arrogant. I have met some good ones (and when they are good they tend to be very good), but most have been cack.

hi jimjams, thanks for that. did you think curious incident was a feelgood portrayal? yikes! i thought it was quite miserable - the family broke-up, the mother walked out, the dad lost his marbles temporarily, the son ends up rejecting the dad, both parents end up being violent to the boy on occasion... it does end up on a happier note though, with a future for christopher at university. i do know that this is light years away from many people's experience of autism...

Oh no curious incident wasn't feel good! It was disturbing! It's not really my experience because the child was verbal. Sometimes I wonder why they put autism and AS together (and I know some adults with autism/AS say the same- Donna Williams I think says that) they can be soooooo different. (For example change doesn't phase my son at all, and he's not all that rigid- whereas the AS kids I've met have been very rigid - and very upset by change). I don't really know much about AS though, just observed it from afar!

The feelgood stuff I meant was more Hollywood style portrayal. You know slightly whacky or reserved kid, where good prevails and they overcome their difficulties type thing. Or the Rainman type with autistic with amazing special skill. This film supposedly shows the reality- apparently its pretty harrowing from the opening scene. In a way I wish the MMR wasn't included in the story line as then it could be watched without controversy iyswim.

oh sorry, i didn't get it, you mean AS - Asperger's Syndrome, right? i assumed christopher was autistic - shows my ignorance i'm afraid. oh dear

i agree with you about the drama. i am v. much a pro-jabber and i tend to agree with the arguments against drama or journalism which give the impression that the evidence is equally balanced. ok, ok - don't shout everyone, i agree that more research ought to be done.

anyway, yes, i agree the drama would still be interesting without the topical mmr angle. had planned not to watch it because of the mmr controversy thing - but maybe i will now.

yes, i can see the rainman thing must be really, really annoying.

Agree that Curious Incident is a great book. Like Jimjams the portrayal of the boy does not relate to my experience with my own son but, boy, could I relate to the parents! Not what happened to them but how they felt I thought Christopher was a good AS portrayal from the few I know.
Have you seen Mercury Rising with Bruce Willis? No, he isn't the autistic one in it!! But the ASD boy in it, I thought, was very good. I've got it on video but can't watch it again as its hardly my idea of fun. I'm not sure I'll watch the TV prog as I either feel upset, angry or both with these things.

that's interesting, davros, about the parents. dh said he thought the mother was a b*h, but i thought i would have walked out too...

i have seen mercury rising. it was panned by the critics but i thought it was rather good. lol @ bruce willis! i much prefer him since his reincarnation as a "serious" actor than in his grubby, sweaty vest days.

BK AS is part of the autistic spectrum, but high functioning auti or AS kids like christopher are way out of my experience. They end to have very different problems. Certainly not necessarily easier- just different. For example my friend's little girl, is very inteeligentm very high functioning AS- but they have had a nightmare getting her into mainstream school. She had to start with 5 minutes (literally) - first in the corridor then a gradual build up. Meanwhile my non-verbal auti has breezed his way into mainstream school and hasn't been phased at all (he doesn't do assemblies etc). My friend's dd cannot cope with any slight change at all. For example recently her aunt had to take her to school- and she couldn;t do it, they had to come home and she had to miss the day. HOwever if you met her in a relaxed environment you wouldn't realise there was anything wrong at all- you'd spot my ds1 in seconds.

I haven't seen mercury rising- I have heard about it though and heard the asd boy was good.

Agree about the parents in curious incident. Some of the dad's reactions I could really identify with.

you're not harbouring any murderous tendencies towards the neighbours' pets are you, jimjams

i can see there is a vast difference between children on the autism/asd spectrum... there must be a huge difference between various types of "special needs" too. i seem to remember christopher is quite funny about this in the book.

Another thought about the film and its bias etc.

I'm pretty certain that in making the film they got a lot of advice from AiA - Allergy induced Autism- a charity. They work closely with several scientists- including of course the contraversial Andy Wakefield and the slightly less but still controversial Paul Shattock. However they also work with Rosemary Waring at Uni of Birmingham. She's big into sulphation systems and autism- and as far as I ca tell she's pretty well respected all round.

So it may be biased, but it shouldn't be too out there in terms of science.

Perhaps they wanted Liam Donaldson to have a cameo roll "line up get your lovely MMR jabs here...."

role even

Does anyone know anything about the boy who plays the role of the autistic child? I've just seen the advert for the film and the autism seems very real. Is he autistic in real life or just acting?

He's a child actor- but I've been told he's very good. The person who plays the second child role (I think its his brother in the film) has an autistic brother. My friend's little boy who has a small part is autistic.

Wow! I only saw those few seconds but he was very good. I'm impressed!

I heard he was! From everything I've heard the autism side of things has been very well researched. I want to see a trailer now

They've been showing the trailer on C5 tonight. Only a short scene though but it looks good.

if i miss this (and i might as i might be moving that day) could someone record it for me?

Suppose it is biased? So bloody what, I hope its REALLY biased and causes all sorts of trouble. At least that way the issues are getting attention and there may be some good debates come out of it. Highly recommend Mercury Rising, that boy was an actor but very well done I thought. Do you want me to send you the video Jimjams? I can't see me watching it again although its good. Sadly I've rather liked Bruce since Moonlighting, through Die Hard and the other end at Sixth Sense.

so bloody what? the issues get plenty of attention, far more so than is merited by the evidence. uptake rates of the mmr vaccine are falling and vulnerable members of the population are at risk. mothers like me worry and don't know whether to vaccinate or not. opportunistic single vaccine suppliers clean up. meanwhile the real issues, i.e. that every vaccine is potentially risky, are obscured. yes i do mind it being biased.

BK- sorry but you have wondered ont shaky ground here. The scientific evidence that there is a problem (and there is evidence that there may be a problem)- gets much less airtime than the MMR is safe articles fanfared by the d of h. (I did a little survey). Most media articles favour the MMR- even the articles I have read on this have described Wakefilef as being a maverick. Before he got into the MMR business he was a highly respected gastroenterologist. Not a nutter writing for witch doctors weekly. If the whole MMR link is as shaky as it is portrayed then a person of average intelligence shouldn't be swayed by out and out bias.

The people in all this who get the least attention are the children who have been damaged. Wakefield who did work with them has been hounded out of the country. Mothers are ridiculed and told they just imagined their chld was developing normally, and in the meantime they're left with a child who was developing normally but now has bowel problems, is unable to commuinicate and will never live an independent life. BTW- the govt officially prefers to deny that bowel problems are ven asociated with autism- and yet the All PArty Parliamentary Group on Autism recently released a manifesto which recognised the bowel problems and said it was important that children were able to access care for this and that further research into the causes should be carried out.

I'd watch the film if I was you to see what life with autism is like. Most days there is nothing good about it- other than a conitinual lesson about what is important in life. Of course the film is biased - its a true story about a boy who was seemingly MMR damaged, but rather than calling it biased why not just see it as one family's story and what they have been though. I think if it does give a good portrayal of the awfulness of autism then you may understand why if there is chance that some children are being damaged by vaccinations- people make such a fuss about it. OK the numbers- if they do exist- are very small, but it is destroying families.

BTW if the film does go into the attempts to steal the spinal fluid- that is true- not made up (not sure if it does or not- but would explain why the lawywers have had to work overtime).

Not sure you can blame the single jabs people really- the givt could get rid of them immediately by making singles available on the NHS.

well jimjams, i've got a number of points and then i will leave it as i know how heated these things get.

1. i resent the comment "a person of average intelligence shouldn't be swayed by out and out bias" - so everyone who is pro MMR is of less than average intelligence, eh? that is a ludicrous remark.

2. i couldn't find much evidence "against" the MMR when i was searching for it - compared with the overwhelming amount of data out there from many countries around the world indicating it has been used for many years without a link to autism having been observed. if most media articles favour the MMR - that's because the evidence points that way. and one should be careful about media coverage. the articles themselves may be ultimately pro MMR - but headlines such as - an example - "another question raised over MMR" - don't give a balanced view, they just create noise. If there were a generally held perception that media coverage is pro MMR, the take up rate in areas of london, including the one in which i live wouldn't be down to nearly 60%.

3. i can't comment on andrew wakefield's reputation - but he wouldn't be the first person to ruin his reputation by making a well publicised mistake.

4. it's a cheap rhetorical trick to suggest that i don't care or understand about autism just because i am pro vaccination. i don't understand about autism - but that's because i have no experience of living with it, not because of my views on vaccination. i'm sure it is devastating - and people are desperate to find out what has caused it.

5. i haven't called this film biased. i don't know if it is biased or not - and neither does anyone else on this board. none of us have seen it yet. i was responding to davros's comment "so what if it is bloody biased" - i do not want any biased portrayals of this issue for the reasons i mentioned. of course i have heard about the controversy surrounding it.

6. i do not believe single jabs should be available on the nhs. why should the nhs scare resources be used for single jabs when the evidence that they are somehow safer just isn't there? the money could be better used on research on bowel conditions as you mention, or on better support for autistic children which you have mentioned many times is inadequate.

right, that's me, i've said my piece and i'm not getting into this again.

except one final thing.

actually, i agree that the risks of vaccination should be much better publicised. children have been damaged by vaccines - not just the mmr. i would definitely like to see more research into the autism/bowel disease link and thimerosil related issues. i just think this needs to be done in the light of a rational weighting of the relative risk.

i really am done now.

done most of the points to death so will just clarify my point about a person on average intelligence not being swayed by bias. What I meant was that if this film is loony in its portrayal of the dangers of the MMR (and I have no idea whether it is or not) then someone of average intelligenceisn't going to have a major panic attack and not give MMR. Rather like I watched the Rockewell incident but don't spend the time worrying about alien attack. If films are loony in their portrayal they lose credibility- they certainly don't gain it. Wasn't being anti MMR at all on that- TBH I tend to believe MMR is a minor problem. I just think its a pity that the families who's lives have been destroyed- quite ;possibly because of it are portrayed as loons.

How can any pieces on the MMR not be biased. On the one hand you have the line that the MMR is absolutely 100% totally safe (wich is obviouly crap even if you ignore the autism stuff) and on the other you have the line that it is pushing some children into autism. One side says it does, one side says it doesn't. How can anything be balanced when the absolute evidence isn't out there.

Forget the MMR line- watch the film and see what autism is really like- everything I've heard says that that portrayal is highly accurate.

Hope people who do watch it realise then why the line "I would rather my child became autistic than caught measles" is probably not what they would actually want at all.