Dislike watching movies because of low Theory of Mind?

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My husband can relax very easily by watching movies on TV. He can watch anything. I'm getting bored, especially with romantic movies or many series. Sometimes he's watching eg. "Neighbours" and I can't figure out who is who and what their problem is...and even if I figured it out, I'm not interested. Though there is from time to time a movie I watch, like "The Day the Earth stood still" (remake) a couple month ago. But it's rather seldom. And I like "House".
As a child when the family was watching TV I was sitting there for company but reading a book.

Has this got to do with low Theory of Mind or having another sort of empathy? I feel A LOT for animals and it makes me cry when I watch or read that they are being abused or when I see a truck loaded with chicken to bring to the slaughterhouse. Then I feel empathy, a lot!

Also because of ADD I have trouble concentrating on movies and TV unless it's reeeeeally interesting (sometimes a documentary).

Does a low ToM and dislike watching movies relate to each other?

I think they could be related. Movies about relationships are really boring to me, because I don't have any complicated thoughts about relationships. OK, they are together. OK, now they had a fight, and they broke up. OK, now they are back together. I'm not really thinking about all the internals of how the characters are thinking or feeling. I'm much more likely to notice some cool home decor or the gargoyle statue in the background than the states of mind of the characters.

Another thing I've noticed is that on TV show forums, all the posters have a lot to say about the characters' thoughts and feelings, and it's all very complex and nuanced, and I'm like, "I like the eyebrows of Character A and the scene of the characters eating ice cream together, and the ice cream looked delicious".

I find most shows and movies very boring and way to slow. I hate scenes set in bars almost as much as I hate bars in real life. As soon as I see a bar scene, I can't hear what the characters are saying anymore, just like if I am at the bar myself.

I wouldn't be the least bit surprised. I started a thread like this maybe a week ago, and it had to do with not following movies, no matter how hard I try. Part of it is missing subtle cues, and I'm sure part of it is also an inability to get the character's intentions.

My mum can't sit and watch TV or a movie, unless it's a documentary or based on historical events. Fiction is OK too, so long as it has some kind of relation to actual events, so sci-fi and fantasy are out. She couldn't follow 'Avatar', which has a simple story really. She has never watched soaps, which is unheard of amongst her peers. If my parents sit down to watch something, usually within 10 minutes she's reading a newspaper or doing a crossword, so my dad watches movies when she's out. I pick out things for her to watch, which I know she'll get into, e.g. 'The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas', 'Australia', 'Four Minutes'. I've never been wrong yet with my suggestions.

I think I get most of my traits from my mum. I don't watch soaps either and tend to watch documentaries, science shows, intellectual/fun quizzes. The fiction I watch is 'House', 'CSI' (Las Vegas and NY only) and 'Monk', anything to get me thinking. But, I'm a movie lover. I love sci-fi and fantasy especially. However, I quite regularly give up on something within the first 20 minutes. With me, it's not TOM related. It's badly made movie related.

I'm sure we have some threads about movies before. Ya I don't like new movies. I don't really like watching previews or plot summaries, because I love being surprised. The problem is I often can't figure out what's going on. I have the annoying habit of making DH pause a DVD and explain to me what's going on and they said what. Usually I don't get the story until close to the end. Then after the movie I badger DH with questions and often go online to find out exactly what happened. I feel stupid not being able to understand such simple stuff, but really, stylish speech and facial expressions are just not enough to get meanings across accurately. Nowadays I mostly stick to kids movies.

I used to. I could never understand what the characters were getting so worked up about, couldn't detect a screen lie or the hidden meanings behind all those seemingly indifferent things they said to each other.

But I got used to the screen language of expressions, so now my only problem is attention defecit.

I don't like drama, romance, or horror movies because they "manipulate my emotions," I guess. If I watch a movie it's usually a comedy or superhero movie.

I seldom go to the cinema and have given up on television completely for a while by now. I like some sf movies and TV shows though, like for example X-men, The Matrix, The Time Machine remake, Star Trek. When I like a movie I see it over and over again, so I can pick up on the subtleties and understand it better. One good example for this is Snatch (Guy Ritchie), I had to re-watch it a few times before I could decipher the plot and its mixed-up time-frames.

I was told many times as a kid I'll understand adult movies better when I grow up. Well, I grew up and I have the same problems mentioned in the previous posts.

The problem with today's movies/TV shows is that they are like spicy food, too much camera movement, effect, sound, flash, hurry, too much everything for my taste. I like slow movies, when they're artistic and well-made, like the French movie Tous Les Matins Du Monde, which is about good medieval music and sad human tragedy.

Thank you for your answers! I'm sorry that I haven't seen that thread opened last week, because I haven't been here for a while. As my DX is still quite fresh for me - 10 month, but it feels to me as if it have been yesterday - I guess I have started to analyse myself and it is very helpful to me to read how others experience certain things.

I've always hated "people movies". Titan A.E. was one of my favorite movies for a while but to this day, I wonder why. Maybe I just liked the cute lizard alien. Anyway, I perfer movies about animals.

I do think people are interesting even if i don't totally want to be around them, i think that possibly explains why i enjoy and have no problem watching movies.

Maybe it's something you can develop if you want to.

Some of the best things i've ever found weren't walk up to it and love it situations, for example music with me, I had to force myself to like it by continually exposing myself to it, and it took years of trying. It took me till i was 15 to finally believe that i liked it. You're missing out if you haven't worked out how awesome movies are yet and that'd be a shame.

Sounds like I'm quite the opposite.

I love watching movies because for me they require far less ToM than real life. Maybe it's just because I've watched so many of them I've come to learn that NOTHING, no matter how seemingly insignificant, is EVER insignificant in a movie. Every little thing that happens in a movie MATTERS.

If someone sneezes or coughs, it means something. No director, these days anyway, would allow an actor's inadvertent sneeze to be in a scene, unless it is scripted. If someone lays an object on a surface, and the camera zooms in on it, that's significant. Shots of more than a few seconds of a character's face are significant. That is done purposely to let you as the viewer know that the expressons are important and for you to pay attention to them. When they aren't important, they aren't made obvious.

There's a lot less going on, on screen, than in real life situations, and that's why I find movies far easier to follow than real life. In real life, 90% of what's happening around me, I don't notice at all. In a movie, we're only exposed to a small percentage of what would really be happening around us in real life, so that is much easier for me to follow and interpret.

I just occurred to me though, that I do have severe ADD as well as AS, so that affects how well I deal with movies in contrast to real life. Movies offer far less distraction to me.

Also, unlike other posters here, I do not care for super-hero movies, or action flicks. Too much going on. Too much noise, and the action tends to be too fast. Some are okay. I did like the Bourne series, because there really wan't much plot to follow. Action flicks with fast changing plots though, bore me because I lose track of what's going on, and thus lose the ability to care.

I do watch a LOT of movies, but those I do watch and like most are usually not the most popular ones. Twister bored me, but I loved the mini series Lonesome Dove. For me to maintain interest, there has to be a story, not just a plot that's only there as a framework for special effects and mind-blowing action. The story though, needs not to be so complex it takes plot twists every five minutes, otherwise I can't follow it without hitting rewind repeatedly, which destroys the story flow for me.

My favourite film, since the age of 10, is "2001: A Space Odyssey". Beautiful images and big ideas, I used to cry at the end. But definitely not a 'feelings' movie...

As I've got older I've started to relate to 'people' movies more, and pick up a lot of what's going on. Sometimes I deliberately analyse it, like a chess game. But it takes effort. I usually just like the scenery, the atmosphere, and looking at the people rather than relating to them. My wife and I will watch a drama, and I'll be interested in what's going on, but I'll never relate to characters, where she might. I can relate to the characters if there's some sort of extreme injustice being inflicted upon them, or if they're creating something.

When I watch fiction with our young children I'm always amazed at what they can instinctively tell about the characters' viewpoints and states of minds. Things that would go right over my head.

I love watching movies even though I have a hard time following them. I have always watched people movies even though I didn't know what the heck was going on in them. It was the action I liked in them.

I will watch any movie that catches my interest.

Of course since adolescents I have been analyzing characters and how they may be feeling and what they are thinking. I remember asking questions about it too when I get that obsessed with a movie.

Sure I can tell when characters are mad or upset because they yell or cry and I can tell when they are scared when they scream and run away from something.

But if the movie is aimed at younger age groups, I can understand it better.