Steve Before You (UNLOCKED)

My review of the movie Me Before You

Here’s one of my locked posts. If you enjoy it, please consider subscribing to my paid writings. I need money for… wheelchair stuff. Definitely not chicken fries and iced caramel macchiatos.

---

Being a disabled actor, one of the biggest things I fight and advocate for is accurate representation on screen. Too often, non-disabled writers will write stories about what’s it like being disabled, despite their biggest disability was having a sprained ankle for two weeks. Non-disabled actors will play disabled characters, which is the farthest you can get from being authentic. Even though it’s messed up and unfair to actual disabled performers, actors have won major awards for portraying disability. Danial Day-Lewis, Tom Hanks, and Eddie Redmayne have all won an Oscar for faking being crippled.

Fuck that and fuck them. This practice takes jobs away from hardworking disabled performers and prevents us from even getting our wheel foot in the door. They definitely wouldn’t play a black person on screen, so why is disabled okay? Every award received for this is completely illegitimate. Except Sean Penn. He’s fine.

Out of the most recent uproars of cripface was towards the film Me Before You. Released in 2016, this movie is about a rich guy, played by Sam Claflin, who has everything in the world, gets hit by a bus or something, and becomes paralyzed. The real kicker (not from him because he can’t feel his legs) is that his only desire throughout the entire movie is to kill himself. This may work on suburban white women, but it has real world harmful consequences for the disabled community. It perpetuates the myth and stereotype that we just live in our closets thinking about suicide all day.

The release of this movie adapted by a book of the same title was met with protests and boycotts. The central message sent by disabled advocates was to not support this movie in hopes it would raise awareness to this horrible industry practice and begin to break the cycle of ignoring our complaints and job applications. I immediately endorsed this movement in unity with my no movement brethren and refused to see it.

Five years later, my partner brought up that she wanted to watch it with me. She had already seen it and loved it. I told her my issues and she completely understood, but she persisted, going as far as saying it would even make me cry. I strongly disagreed but, okay. Challenge accepted.

My expectations were precisely met. On top of bad acting, lazy writing and unrealistic circumstances (a disabled guy with a ton of money and great healthcare lmao), it featured every damaging disabled trope. The whiny cripple wants to die and is incapable of finding love because he can’t walk. In this case, his caretaker turned love interest, played by Emilia Clarke, is the one trying to be his savior. Maybe it’s me, but I would do everything I possibly could to stay alive for the Mother of Dragons.

This movie is incredibly predictable and goes just as you would expect from any tale of romance. She falls in love with the disabled guy after realizing her current boyfriend sucks and is a loser, tries to “fix” him and wants him to keep living, he keeps being a bitch despite having the woman of his dreams, and eventually (spoiler alert) offs himself.

The worst part of this viewing experience? I cried. I cried like a baby. I’m talking full blown emotional breakdown with my partner and I sobbing together as she’s yelling “I TOLD YOU” and me screaming “I KNOW.”

I hate this movie so much.

Solidarity forever.

-Steve