Rain Man: Deep Thoughts About Buicks, Toothpicks, and Introducing Autism to Pop Culture

Deep Thoughts About Stupid Sh*t: A Pop-Culture Podcast

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When I was a little kid and I got scared, the Rain Man would come and sing to me.

Join us this week as Tracie shares her deep thoughts about the 1988 film Rain Man, for which Dustin Hoffman won the Oscar for his nuanced portrayal of autistic savant Raymond Babbitt. This comedy/drama, written by Barry Morrow and directed by Barry Levinson, was singled-handedly responsible for introducing autism to American society, it also prompted Raymond's verbal tics to enter the pop culture lexicon as comedy shorthand and left much of our culture believing that autism is synonymous with math savantism.

While the film was careful to show Raymond's dignity and had at least one medical professional point out that his neurodivergence is a difference in psychology ("His brain doesn't work like other people's"), it also conflates "improvement" with Raymond acting more neurotypical--as if autism is something that needs to be cured. (In addition, Tom Cruise's Charlie Babbitt is a jerk who keeps yelling at Raymond which can't be good for his mental health.)

We agree that you are an excellent driver. Please listen along while you drive excellently.

Content warning: The film uses the R slur for disabled individuals, which we discuss in the episode.

This episode was edited by Resonate Recordings.

Our theme music is "Professor Umlaut" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Learn more about Tracie and Emily (including our other projects), join the Guy Girls' family, secure exclusive access to bonus episodes, video versions, and early access to Deep Thou​​ghts by visiting us on Patreon or find us on ko-fi: https://ko-fi.com/guygirls

We're having a party, please come! A Zoom happy hour, Tue, 11/18, 7:30 ET / 6:30 CT. (THERE WILL BE PRESENTS!) So get ready to pour your favorite beverage, overthink some Thanksgiving-themed pop culture, laugh, and feel a little bit smarter.

It’s free, but please register at guygirlsmedia.com/happyhour, so we can share the zoom info with you! (Also, who doesn’t like knowing who’s coming to their party?)

We are Tracie Guy-Decker and Emily Guy Birken, known to our family as the Guy Girls.

We have super-serious day jobs. For the bona fides, visit our individual websites: tracieguydecker.com and emilyguybirken.com. For our work together, visit guygirlsmedia.com

We're hella smart and completely unashamed of our overthinking prowess. We love movies and tv, science fiction, comedy, and murder mysteries, good storytelling with lots of dramatic irony, and analyzing pop culture for gender dynamics, psychology, sociology, and whatever else we find.

We are on socials! Find us on Facebook at fb.com/dtasspodcast and on Insta at instagram.com/guygirlsmedia. You can also email us at guygirlsmedia at gmail dot com. We would love to hear from you!

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1. Introduction to Rain Man Analysis (00:00:00)

2. Film Synopsis and Road Trip Journey (00:09:50)

3. The Las Vegas Card Counting Scheme (00:15:35)

4. Charlie's Growth and Final Decisions (00:21:20)

5. Examining Autism Portrayal and Impact (00:27:23)

6. Legacy and Limitations of the Film (00:38:58)

7. Financial Concerns and Closing Thoughts (00:47:19)