Just saw The Accountant; a few thoughts...

Post Reply New Topic

It's been awhile since I've posted here, and I want to get some input from anyone who saw the movie, "The Accountant". My wife and I saw it tonight, and although the main character seems plausible in some ways as with high functioning autism, I don't think any of us would be able to lead that kind of life (at least I hope not!). But the OCD traits are exactly as I have, and the pain desensitizing is also something I'm all too familiar with. Especially where he gets shot in the thigh, and simply whips out a tourniquet and cuts off the bleeding, as to "worry about it later". I've been known to do things like that (albeit much less spectacularly and not with a gunshot wound).

Any thoughts on how accurate/inaccurate Christian is portrayed in the role?

Charles

WARNING: MINOR SPOILERS IN MY POST BELOW. They won't ruin the movie for you, but I'm revealing a couple things about the movie here so if you'd prefer to see it w/o knowing anything about it don't read my post right now.

I took a date to see this movie last week after hearing very positive reviews from my brother and a coworker.

I was not disappointed. I REALLY liked the movie. While I'm not all about killing and such, I think his character was very VERY well written, portrayed, and acted. I could relate to a LOT of things about his behaviour - especially in my past before I figured out how to get my symptoms under better control. I think they did a wonderful job of portraying someone with AS/HFA, from his missing cues to routines to special interest expertise as well as his altruistic tendencies. It was also very touching to see the portrayal of the non-verbal autistic character's role, too.

But I also liked the movie for other reasons, too. At the beginning I mentioned to my date that the kids on screen were autistic and he replied "I know, I have an autistic brother." That made the whole experience more touching, too. Then there's the truck.. Ben Affleck drives a crew cab F-150.. the type of truck I want someday. And then his character's "why," his reason for pursuing financial gain.. supporting an Autism centre. Not *exactly* my motivation to make money in life, but it's certainly touching and relatable. And while I'm not an accountant, I have studied some accounting and am decently good with financial numbers, stocks/investing etc, so I can relate to that bit of Christian, too.

Overall I definitely recommend this movie.

I've not seen the film yet but I do know a little about the character from interviews and trailers:

* I used to hunt for food but for a while, it was my special interest and I was pretty accurate with a rifle. Archery was another special interest. I used to shoot a bare (no sights) recurve bow and could release 12 arrows in a minute with most of them landing in a dinner plate sized area on the boss. I managed a 40 yard Robin Hood (splitting the previous arrow with another arrow) shot once.
* My pain threshold is pretty high: I've broken my leg (compound spiral fracture of the tibia and fibula) and pulled myself 20 metres underwater to the shore and then up the beach for a helicopter rescue.
* However, I suck at arithmetic and accountancy.
* I am now old and fat

Most autistic character portrayals I have seen have been hit and miss. I wouldn't expect this one to be much different. I don't know if such portrayals can be mesured by how accurate they are, but rather how good the acting is.

In this case, both are pretty good. The guy is very HFA & I could relate to him a fair bit - although I have my symptoms under better control now than he does. Also, it's Ben Affleck.. he's a decent actor.

The non-verbal autistic in the movie is more of a stereotype of someone who is quite severely autistic in comparison to the main character. But still, I thought it was well done vs. insulting or offensive, and the final scene is a nice salute to her.

I'm a bit surprised there isn't more discussion about this movie.

ie debate about him being "too" high functioning
or a classic WP argument about whether he's an ASD role model or not
or at least one person getting upset that he makes people associate autism with gun violence
etc

[/stirs pot]

I had no idea this was part of this film. I'll have to see it! I tend to not care for Ben Affleck much, but I've grown to tolerate him more these days. I'll check it out.

It's a YUGE part of this film & the majority of what makes it worth watching. It's well done, IMO. I really liked it.

I thought it was a good movie and I really liked the ending.

Warner Bros. Developing 'The Accountant' Sequel With Ben Affleck

I don't know any autistic people in real life, so I don't have anyone to compare to. The main character certainly seemed like the autistic kids I've seen in Youtube videos, and he had the autistic traits I've read about.

I was surprised because the movie was more involved than I thought it would be (for some reason I thought it was a drama).

Honestly, Ben Affleck was kinda sexy. I find flat affect and flatish prosody attractive and soothing. The sexiest part was the bathroom fight, when he gave the womon such a calm look while the guy was pressing him up against the wall.

Have you ever seen Adam (2009)? My ASD partner at the time laughed alot because there were so many specific things in the film that matched up with our personal lives. I also really liked Snow cake (2006) with Alan Rickman.

I personally made it only 1/3rd the way into it just because the dramatizations of him a child and so forth really turned me off to the rest of the film. I should probably just try again with it. but man, why do film makers let it go down that path because it's really hard not to find dumbed down over dramatized (usually inaccurate) depictions of ASD? I mean at least with Rainman it was comical.

What about Rainman and/or the accountant's childhood did you find dumbed-down, over-dramatized, and/or inaccurate?

Watched this movie about a month ago. Thought it was quite entertaining. Ben Affleck's character (Christian Wolff) portrayed high functioning autism fairly accurately in my opinion. High functioning autism is very similar to Asperger's just slightly more severe.

I can totally relate to Christian Wolff. He reminded me a lot of myself back in middle and high school. Just I didn't have guns or worked anywhere (Slight spoilers? They were unintentional).

As with the WP user goldfish, my Asperger's symptoms are better managed nowadays than further back in time.

I heard there may be a sequel to this movie. I certainly look forward to it. I'd like to know what Christian Wolff has been up to.

With the Accountant in the beginning of the movie they just seem to dramatize it with the puzzle that he was doing and the other autistics wigging out in the room. His "meltdown" over not being able to find the last puzzle piece was kinda silly (despite that kind of thing being a plausible reason for having one). I understand why they needed to inject us with all the precursors about autism and autism symptoms but it was too much too fast and mostly the acting was inauthentic. I guess with both The Accountant and Rain Man they make characters that more closely resemble either an intellectual disability or at its best low functioning autism (which is fine when the two aren't regularly being mashed together). It just doesn't seem convincing I guess (he's extremely low functioning as a child and then suddenly as an adult he's high functioning). As an aside I'm also not sure how I feel about this message that autistics should almost punish themselves by flooding uncomfortable sensory information just to be apart of normal society, in other words "they should just get over it". Again I didnt finish the film so maybe if I had given it more of a chance I might have liked it. I just get really turned off when I see the above in films. I guess ASD makes me picky about this sort of thing lol.

Last edited by brea593 on 30 Jun 2017, 9:11 pm, edited 1 time in total.

What about it was inauthentic?


So you think that Rain Man wasn't intended to portray someone with intellectual disability, but just seemed intellectually disabled because of poor characterization? Given that he couldn't live independently, I think Rain Man was intended to be a character with ID.


Really. I didn't view him as a low functioning child. Not much of his childhood was shown, and I just assumed that the meltdowns over the puzzle and his mom leaving were...just meltdowns, not necessarily his usual behavior. He spoke, he attended a regular school, he learned to fight and speak at least a little bit of other languages. All that made him seem not low-functioning.


I don't think that was intended to be a message. Obviously his father gave him a lot of unusual "treatments," so I just saw that as another parenting quirk that got continued into adulthood, not something every autistic person should go through.