Film number 8 Unforgotten:Twenty-Five Years After Willowbrook

Film number:8
Film name: Unforotten: Twenty-Five Years After Willowbrook
Source: Netflixe Instant Watch
Rating: 8/10


If I deprived a dog or cat in then United States right now of love, and food and water or cleanliness I would be in jail and rightfully so, but no so long ago in the United States it was OK to deprive the mentally or physically challenged American Citizens of all their basic rights and needs.  We are not talking about the 1900's, we are talking about the 1970's!  I watched this movie and felt shame and sadness.

Back in the day doctors pressured parents and families to abandon all hope for any child born with any mental handicaps that made them "not easy to care for".  This includes down syndrome, retardation or any mental challenge that left children with special needs.  This film that chronicled one so called "school" on Staten Island that housed thousands of the mentally or physically handicapped with out dignity is very infamous.  RFK visited this home and had a lot of questions about it's lack of care or concern or even staff, was also exposed years later by a very young reporter name Geraldo Rivera.  Seriously?  It took that long to expose child abuse of the most vulnerable?  We are pathetic if we think this is ok.

This movie chronicles several families of the disabled and their experiences, talked into placing their loved ones into institutions, where care and compassion were not present even in the most mundane activities, ie patients who could not feed themselves had their food slopped on a tray and if they did not get any into their mouths within an allotted time went hungry as well as dirty. 

I can not say I enjoyed watching this movie at all. When I received a text while watching this film, and was asked how I was doing, my response was "I want to punch very bad people to death."   It was gut wrenching to hear stories about humans being sensory deprived and tortured due to lack of staff and compassion.  But it was also life affirming to see families come back together after being hoodwinked out of loving their child or sibling in their daily lives for so many years come back together and rally around someone who is vulnerable or not considered healthy or cute by a lot of other people.  They all focused on how far the individual had come since Willowbrook and how much more potential lay inside them.  

Danny Aiello  narrated and appeared in this movie and he looked just like he did in Madonna's "Papa Don't Preach" video, concerned, disappointed and sad.  How did we waste a whole generation because they might not be attractive when they grew up?  But they could be joyful, and loving and stimulated by things we take for granted.  The most upsetting tale was told by the man who lived it.  Bernard was thought to be retarded and left to to rot at Willowbrook, but was merely physically slowed down by Cerebral Palsy.  I am not even kidding you, years ago I worked with a guy with CP who was smarter than I will ever be, by far, but moved his body differently and spoke a bit slurred.  This is what was done to a person with all their wits about them, because it took them longer to get their words out! 

We just have to do better!  We have to.  No one should be set aside like trash because of their IQ, and no parent should be pressured to give their baby away due to the body they were born into.  I hope just like concentration camps, that these ideas are far in the past and that although they are crimes against all of humanity they will not happen again because we have learned so much and come so far.