Far From the Tree

Andrew Solomon wrote his titular bestselling 2012 book to come to terms with his mother’s hostile attitude after he came out as gay. How do parents react to children who prove different from their hopes, Solomon asked, and more importantly, how should they? Rachel Dretzin’s documentary cannot convey the near-1,000-page book’s breadth and complexity; instead it offers a few case studies to illustrate the basic theme, most of which are touching and even uplifting. The film profiles Jason, a 41-year-old man with Down syndrome struggling to live a normal life, and his devoted mother, Emily; Jack, an autistic teen believed to be uncommunicative until it was discovered he could write on a computer; Loini, whose life with dwarfism was a lonely one until she was persuaded to attend a Little People of America meeting and was liberated by the camaraderie; and Leah and Joe, who met one another at a previous little people convention, became romantically involved, and are now planning to have a child. The final subject is the outlier among the group, a teen named Trevor who murdered an 8-year-old boy, a crime that shocked his family, who now grapple with the possibility that he might suffer from some genetic abnormality. This last case fits with the emphasis on how parents deal with children who have fallen “far from the tree,” but it seems fundamentally different from the others, involving a choice that might be inexplicable but was still a behavioral choice rather than an identifiable biological reality. Regardless, Far From the Tree is a worthy cinematic attempt to reflect the theme of Solomon’s book, even in much-condensed form. Recommended. [Note: DVD extras include deleted scenes (42 min.). Bottom line: a solid extras package for a psychologically powerful documentary.] (F. Swietek)