‘Go Hard or Go Home’

Family drama shows warts and all

by Dave Gerardi

“You can’t take people with autism to Vegas and win money,” says Elissa Down, laughing.

If Rain Man is autism through Hollywood’s glasses, then The Black Balloon, which Down wrote and directed, is what it looks like when you pop out the rose-colored lenses.

The Black Balloon follows the Mollisons, an Australian family whose teenage son Charlie has autism. Toni Collette plays the mom, the rock of the family who communicates with Charlie using Makaton sign language. When she suffers complications with her pregnancy, the role of Charlie’s caretaker falls on her neuro-typical teenager, Thomas (Rhys Wakefield). Thomas is conflicted between fitting in at high school and having a ‘normal’ life versus his love for his brother. Like Johnny Depp’s character in What’s Eating Gilbert Grape? Thomas feels resentment and shame mixed in with duty and love. He meets a girl in his swimming class, Jackie (Gemma Ward) but worries that she’ll dump his ass when she sees Charlie at his worst.

Down’s film is based on her childhood growing up. She used the Thomas character as her proxy because people generally “don’t expect” a brother to be the caretaker. Down has two brothers with autism. Charlie is based on her youngest brother who ran through the streets in his underwear, dashed into strangers’ houses, smeared poo and masturbated—all depicted in the movie. “The film was cheaper than therapy,” Down laughs, “but family life was funny.”

This was the early 90s (both in the film and in Down’s life). Her mother was the center of the family and to sign. Her dad was in the army and sacrificed career opportunities so the family could stay in one place for a longer period of time (rather than the frequent moves that accompany army life). “They were accused of being bad parents,” Down explains. “Mothers are blamed for everything. It’s amazing they still sign up to have children.”

Down was reluctant to dig too deeply when she started writing the script. “Part of me held back,” she explains. “I wanted to protect myself. (Filmmaker) Jane Campion took me under he wing and said, ‘Who cares what people think?’” Her advice inspired Down to push deeper and make the film more personal. “You’re not meant to be half-assed in the land of emotions. You have to put every bit of your soul there. That’s how you move people to tears or laughter,” she says. “Go hard or go home.”

The result is a much grittier look at autism that fiction rarely seeks. “We haven’t seen Charlie before,” says Down. “He grunts; he has a lust for life; he can be angry, have tantrums. It’s what families deal with day to day. You get in trouble when you second guess the audience. When you stick to the truth, the audience goes
with you.”

To prepare for the role of Charlie, Luke Ford (the son in The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor) worked closely with Down to shape the nuances of the character. He filmed himself and sent the footage to Down for critiques. Ford also spent time with Down’s family. On some days, Down sent Ford and Wakefield out shopping or bowling for the entire day completely in character. The experiences gave Wakefield a sense of how other people reacted to a person like Charlie (staring, mostly).

Gemma Ward’s character Jackie is, in many ways, like Thomas and Charlie’s mom. They cope better than most. They handle disasters with acceptance and a laugh. Perseverance comes easy for them. Does it come too easy? Is Jackie too accepting? Down doesn’t think so. “I had a lot of fantastic friends who were beautiful like that,” Down says. “People can be really sweet; we find it easier to believe that people will be mean than people will be nice.” In Australia, she adds, “we have this thing where we just pull together and that’s what you do. You don’t whinge about it.”

For more information, visit TheBlackBalloonMovie.com.