Me and My Dad, The Promised Weekend - Review (With Spoilers)

For a while from the beginning, I think it was to convey the difficulties of living as an autistic child to the audience, but around the school scenes, the sound design was intentionally expressed with uncomfortable volume and clattering noises.

I thought it was amazing how they deepened our understanding by using production techniques to share with the audience the hidden hardships of a child who looks like any other ordinary kid at first glance, before moving into the story of the soccer trip.

Autism is a disability that we sort of know about, but only vaguely. This film shows one way a family with a child who has this disability faces it (like 'Change the chair at the bus stop! Mom, fix it!'), and it shows that while there doesn't seem to be a single right answer, life moves forward by trying and trying again with every single event just to live together. It's not a film that wants to present a 'this is the right answer' solution.

At the very end, a subtitle appears saying, '1 in 100 children is autistic. May your understanding deepen,' and in that sense, I think it is a truly meaningful film.

And this is also a story about a dad.
He thought he understood how hard it was for the mom, but he only truly understood it after facing his son himself.

This applies to everyone. It's that kind of experience where you think you understand, but you don't, and you only truly know it after experiencing it yourself.

Regarding Jason, because he goes on a soccer trip, the audience tends to expect 'growth' or 'change'.

However, Jason doesn't set rules because he is 'immature'; he sets rules because he has a 'disability' called autism, and he lives his life with peace of mind because of them.

So I felt that it might be rude or misguided for the audience to expect change, and I watched the story unfold while remaining unsure of how I should watch over him.

As a result, in scenes where Jason decides on his own to 'try and endure the body search' or chooses to 'endure and watch until the end' rather than wanting to leave when beer is spilled on him and he's on the verge of a panic attack, I felt that rather than change or growth, the number of 'choices' he could make increased because he had gained experience.

In the car scene where he panicked at a baby's cough, his reaction changed in the later meal scene to gently covering his mouth at the sound of a baby's cough. I wonder if the various experiences Jason accumulated slightly improved his adaptability.

It might not have been intentional, and it might just be a byproduct of the trip, but thinking that the increase in experience made life a little easier for Jason makes me feel that the trip was a wonderful choice.

The fact that it's a true story, too, you know.
Considering that not every family tries to face a disability head-on like Jason's family does, I felt that it is important for there to be opportunities for the general public to deepen their understanding of autism, and that the significance of this film is very great.

I'm glad I watched it.