Amy

Bad writing and poor direction are the two qualities that stand out in this film. An anachronism that probably wasn't good when it was released, is now much worse with 40 years reflection. What I know is meant to be a positive, uplifting film, turns out to be a reminder that it wasn't very long ago that society's views of women and children with disabilities was abysmal. The misogyny is appalling and the treatment of the children in the film is overly simplistic and degrading. The actions of the school board and the woman who runs the school are overly cruel and harsh. The conflict between the teacher and these foils is poorly developed. It was bad all the way around. Don't waste your time with this one.

Amy offers a truly heartwarming and insightful look into the world of deaf and blind children, beautifully brought to life by its wonderful cast of actors. The narrative is grounded in reality, and most likely everyone knows someone or has met a blind or deaf person in their life. The story centers on Amy Medford, a woman who leaves her privileged life after the death of her own child, to teach at a school for children with sensory impairments.

The film excels at portraying real world challenges faced by its young characters. The commitment by the Disney studio to feature real deaf children in roles as the schools deaf children is extraordinary and leads to the story's authenticity. This dedication to a down to earth portrayal distinguishes Amy from more mundane drama films. Amy is often compared, usually unfairly to the 1962 film The Miracle Worker about Helen Keller. They are similar films, but one is biographical and focuses on one person, but Amy is more about the community of all deaf people.

Ahhh... the cruel vagaries of watching everything on Disney Plus in alphabetical order. Occasionally it might throw up an underappreciated gem, but more frequently it's something like "Amy", a film that despite some solid moments, probably deserves the forgotten status that it now has.

Amy Medford (Jenny Agutter) leaves her affluent husband and comes to work on a rural school/boarding house for blind and deaf children. Though the perceived wisdom at the time was otherwise, Amy believes that deaf children can be taught how to speak, rather than just focus on sign language, and sets about that goal. Though she eventually wins over the school, her husband continues to search for her and hires a private detective to locate her and bring her home.

The problem with "Amy" is that though is commendably worthy, it's painfully dull. It's directed by Vincent McEveety, who would direct quite a lot of the live action Disney films across the late 70's and early 80's. For the most part, this is competently done and very few of the failings land on him, but there is a composite shot at the end of the film that looks woefully dated now. Agutter is decent, as the titular character. The was the same year that she was in "An American Werewolf in London" but as this is a period piece it's a lot more mannered and buttoned up, but with a secret that will eventually have to come out. She does drift close to a love affair with another character - the local Doctor played by Barry Newman. What I found interesting about that is that he looks much older than her, and indeed a bit of research suggests he's 14 years older, and it struck me as pretty unrealistic.

Though the performances are pretty solid across the board, there is a sense to impending tragedy that encircles the whole thing. For me though, there's not enough going on to alleviate the boredom.

"Amy" is the story of a woman's crusade to teach deaf children how to communicate at the turn of the century. It's not the film the original "Miracle Worker" is, but it's effective in it's own way. Jenny Agutter is the star of the film, and she makes it work. The impact of her loss and how much it affected her is pivotal to the film, and she's wonderful in the role. I shed a few tears during my initial viewing of the movie, and while it's not a tearjerker it's subject matter is emotional. It's not available anywhere at the moment, but if you can find it, it's worth a look.

In the early 20th century, Amy Medford (Jenny Agutter) leaves her wealthy Bostonian husband Elliot (Craig Robinson) following the death of her deaf son when Elliot forced her to send him to an institution. Amy moves to the Appalachian mountains where she takes a position as a speech teacher at the Parker School for the Blind and Deaf to teach deaf-mutes how to speak. Over time she bonds with the children, including Henry Watkins (Otto Rechenberg) who excels as her best student while struggling against inadequate resources and cultural prejudice.

Amy was developed under the working title Amy on the Lips as a television movie by Disney as an attempt at making a film catering more to adult tastes and sensibilities while within the confines of the Disney brand. The movie was made in cooperation with the California School for the Deaf in Riverside, California and featured founder of the National Theater for the Deaf founder Lou Fant in a prominent supporting role as the school superintendent. During production Disney was apparently impressed by what they saw and felt the movie warranted a theatrical release (albeit one that was tied to a re-release of Alice in Wonderland, per the contemporary review in The Washington Post). The movie received very weak reviews from critics of the time who lamented the film's reliance on melodrama often distracting from the story's core of learning to speak and the movie never really had much staying power aside from an 80s VHS release and a manufactured on demand DVD available only from the Disney website. Amy means well, but it's thoroughly misguided despite its intentions.

I will say on a positive note that it was good to cast actual deaf children in the roles of the students as well as Lou Fant as school superintendent Ferguson. Fant is particularly good in the role exhibiting a genuineness and sincerity in his performance that's very down to Earth, and he'd had work on other films involving American Sign Language including the much more successful and well known Children of a Lesser God. Otto Rechenberg is really good as Henry Watkins and his interactions with Jenny Agutter's Amy are probably the high point of the movie dramatically speaking because it's the only time where the focus feels like it should be and it helps that Rechenberg is a charismatic presence.

Where Amy faulters is where most movies of this type faulter in that the story isn't about deaf children how to speak, but rather the primary focus is on Jenny Agutter's Amy moving past the grief of the death of her deaf son and escaping her loveless marriage to her husband Elliott and finding the "right man" in Barry Newman's quirky Irish doctor Ben Corcoran. With the exception of Rechenberg, most of the deaf children aren't given focus and it's because the movie doesn't want us to focus on them and instead wants us to focus on Amy overcoming her problems and building her romance. I'm not saying things like this shouldn't be in this story, but it plays pretty disingenuous when the characterization is greater for the abled teacher and doctor and even Elliott, while the characterization of the deaf students feels like it's maybe 30-40% of the movie. The crux of the movie should be these deaf children learning and struggling to communicate, but the movie isn't confident in its own premise so it keeps heaping on extraneous elements like the subplot of Elliot looking for Amy, one of the Blind children dying, or the late arrival of a 19 year old deaf mute that could've served as a movie in and of itself. The deaf children are basically there to serve as props for the development of its abled characters like Jenny Agutter's Amy and it strikes a fatal blow to this well intentioned movie by suffocating it with extraneous and limp melodramatic and romantic hogwash. And the movie all but admits this by not providing any subtitles for the ASL used by the children in this movie because heaven forbid we know the thoughts of the kids instead of our uninteresting main characters. The movie also feels like the TV film it was intentioned to be through and through, and I can't imagine how poorly this would've looked on a cinema screen.

The Miracle Worker this is not. Granted it's probably unfair to compare Arthur Penn to Vincent McEverty (director of films such as Million Dollar Duck and Superdad) but taking names out of the equation: The Miracle Worker focused on Helen Keller and Anne Sullivan as it was supposed to, while Amy pushes its deaf children learning to speak into the background while giving focus to its titular character who isn't deaf. Unless you need a reminder that "the deaf are people too" (which is where this movie's message starts and stops) there's not much here that engages you on an emotional or thematic level with any potentially interesting characters or ideas kept strictly at arms length.