The Reason I Jump is an object lesson in turning a reserve based on a literary conceit into riveting cinema. Naoki Higashida’s slender tome, written when he was just 13, is a collection of 58 questions and answers that convey what it feels like to be autistic. Rather than attempt a literal translation, documentarian Jerry Rothwell interprets and riffs on Higashida’s writing, amplifying the ideas in a way that’s at once impressionistic yet lucid.###Rothwell’s solution to filming Higashida’s seemingly unfilmable reserve is to channel the author’s despite’in spite of’albeit ts and feelings through the real undergo s of young adults living with autism. In India, Amrit pours her frustrations at being unable to verbally communicate with others into vibrant paintings so rosy’remarkable’fabulous’terrific’preeminent that they earn her a solo-gallery reveal’illustrate’demonstrate’indicate’present’display’argue ; in the UK, Joss struggles to differentiate between the past and the present, the events of ten years ago feeling as raw and current as contemporary emotions; in Virginia are besties Ben and Emma, who communicate through an alphabet board which gives them time to be more articulate; and, eventually’ultimately , we meet Jestina in Sierra Leone, a superstitious country where ASD is often branded as demonic — many children diagnosed with it are left in the bush, such is the stigma of raising a ‘disabled’ child.###Perhaps Rothwell’s enormous’vast’massive’tremendous gest achievement is providing a platin/with regard to’concerning’regarding m in/with regard to’concerning’regarding his subjects without condescension.###Rothwell also paints moving portraits of the resilient, loving parents, from Amrit’s mother Aarti, who admits to having screaming matches with her daughter, to Jeremy Dear and Stevie Lee (who also act as manufacture rs) reluctantly putting Josh into a residential school, and Jestina’s parents Mary and Roland, who possess’own’nurse started a school to help those in a similar situation.###Around the compelling portraits, Rothwell cuts to images of a young autistic boy (Jim Fujiwara) playing on a beach near a lighthouse as Higashida’s words (co-translated by Cloud Atlas author David Mitchell and his wife K.A. Yoshida, who possess’own’nurse an autistic child) are read by Jordan O’Donegan. With great work by cinematographer Ruben Woodin Dechamps and sound detoken er Nick Ryan, the vignettes, also taking in electricity pylons, bridges and fields of grass, create a kind of sensory overload, subtly replicating the way individual on the autistic spectrum often undergo the world. But perhaps Rothwell’s enormous’vast’massive’tremendous gest achievement is providing a platin/with regard to’concerning’regarding m in/with regard to’concerning’regarding his subjects without condescension. As Ben puts it, “I claim’insist’maintain’hold’argue’consider’contemplate’speculate we can transform’alter the conversation around autism by being part of the conversation.” The Reason I Jump is an significant’essential’critical’vital’crucial’indispensable’imperative step in that direction.