Temple Grandin

There is grandeur in this view of life.  So said Darwin at the conclusion of On The Origin Of Species to comfort those who might’ve been distressed at his shattering the illusion of design in biology.  No less grandeur lies at the heart of Temple Grandin’s view of life, which is fundamentally different than anyone who lived before her or ever will again. Her life is remarkable enough that a film was made of it, and that is the subject of this article. My own life is closer to hers, as it also lies on the autism spectrum in the form of Asperger’s Syndrome, but I do not pretend to understand her world, which is the first mistake many neurologically typical people make.  Oh I understand obsession well enough and having one’s talent focused on a laser on something to a degree that surpasses ordinary human understanding.  For Ms. Grandin, it is the care and management of herd animals and for me it is writing.  These gifts come at a significant price for autistics and the film does not shy away from portraying the intense pain that is daily life for people whose neurology differs from ordinary human beings in ways scientists are in the investigative infancy of comprehending.  Neither does the film fail to notice the degree to which intellect and special gifts are the saving grace of the autistic life, as well as the only true armor with which such individuals are outfitted with in a cruel world.  So it is that Ms. Grandin has become one of the most successful individuals with autism alive and quite probably of all those that have ever lived.  In making a film about an autistic, a filmmaker must necessarily make a film about that individual autistic, because nobody is quite as singular an individual as a person on the spectrum.  So I am happy to report that Temple Grandin is a film about its titular character in a very specific way.  Similarities between my own life and the lives of many with autism are there, but they are there organically and allowed to wash over the viewer as much as the cinematography and production design.

     As many reviewers have noted, the film opens with Ms. Grandin, as played by Claire Danes, addressing the audience directly and abruptly, just as she might if one were to encounter her in real life.  To some degree, the film is presented in a non-linear fashion, and I believe this is correct choice.  Flashbacks to the abject misery of her early childhood and the abject misery it caused her mother are necessary because first we must be introduced to her as a young adult of relatively high functioning.  The work it took to get her to that point is talked about some in the film, only briefly shown, and must have been something of a herculean effort on both Ms. Grandin’s part and on the part of her mother.  Without question, her social skills are worse and her strangeness more obvious from her speech, behavior, and priorities than are my own.  When we see her making progress in her late teens and early adulthood, it is always because a kind person has been patient with her and taken the time to understand her perspective and how she works.  This is the crucial ingredient for any autistic to grow more functional and beyond the margins of such kindness and patience lays the abyss.  Occasional scenes of bullying and unjust responses to her reasonable outrage over it abound, but mostly the way people react to things like her hug machine, a device based upon a steel cage used to calm cattle that she uses to calm herself down and experience the sensation of being hugged she is virtually unable to tolerate in humans, are understandable.  Human beings dislike eccentricity and the more severe it is the less they like it, or, at some point, are willing to tolerate it.  The real meat of the story, and even though it’s about cattle I promise that’s not a pun, is in how she uses her intelligence and unique insight to revolutionize the handling of herd animals.  I well understand the power of being able to simply blast through walls on the basis of simply being right and knowing what you’re talking about.  Expertise in one’s specialty area is the ace you get to play when you have autism, and Ms. Grandin uses her insight into herd animals far better than I’ve ever figured a way to use my writing ability.

     Part of the enjoyment of watching this film is seeing Claire Dames having an acting breakthrough.  When I first noticed this actress, she was known best for her role in a short-lived cult sitcom and for playing Juliet in perhaps the most laughable production of Shakespeare’s beloved tragedy ever produced.  Off the top of my head, I also remember seeing her playing the love interest in Terminator 3: Rise Of The Machines and the female lead in the quality adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s Stardust.  Essentially, she’s been serviceable and in good projects for most of her career, but I would contend that she’s never been given a chance to shine.  Temple Grandin is Ms. Danes truly coming into her own as an actress, and that’s largely because of how much the role is a stretch for her.  Ms. Danes has an austere Hollywood delicate beauty to her, while Ms. Grandin, both in the film and in real life, is a rather gritty character unafraid to deal with hard men, harder animals, and get down and dirty in the mud.  Witness her standing next to the real Temple Grandin as she accepted her Golden Globe for her performance in the film and you’ll understand why the glamorous Ms. Danes transformed herself every bit as much as Charlize Theron did to wide acclaim to play a homely serial killer in Monster.  Perhaps you’re wondering about the ins and outs of how Ms. Grandin revolutionized the cattle industry and the film explains it a bit.  It involves having them walk in a circle instead of a straight line so they don’t become spooked, providing them walls and solid footing in the slaughterhouse so they don’t become distracted or fall, and generally recognizing that the more comfortable the beasts are the more efficiently they’ll march to their deaths and onto our plates.  How and why this works, I don’t think I completely understand and perhaps it is the case that only Temple Grandin understands why it works.  That’s what makes her a genius and what allowed her to build a life worthy of making a film about her.

-Frank