<i>I am Sam</i>

I can only interpret Ms Agnes C. Galea-Curmi's letter as the work of an extreme fanatic. Otherwise how could one explain such a preposterous attitude as to associate me and my review with "a writing style reminiscent of the days when euthanasia (mercy killing) and eugenics... were still considered legitimate".

Had she bothered to see the film she's defending, she may have reserved her "anguish" for a film that takes a serious, heartbreaking issue and reduces it to fodder for a soap opera.

When she states that "the author (me) expresses with fervour that no person with an intellectual disability should be allowed to bring up as his daughter as a single parent," Ms Galea-Curmi is being deliberately misleading.

That is a sweeping blanket statement whereas the film, and my review, dealt with a single and particular case.

In that situation, I fervently believe that the child must be protected at all costs and the last I heard there are laws meant to ensure that protection.

This was clearly stated in my review and if Ms Galea-Curmi rushes to complain without having read my review properly, I have no time, space or inclination to quote my own review at length to correct her. All that she, or anyone else, has to do is to refer to my review.

Regarding my comment about the difficulty of making a realistic film about a mental retard without depressing the audience, this is a fact of life that has been repeatedly proven over decades of audience reaction and box-office figures. It can be done, as the magnificent Rain Man did, but this was not the case with I Am Sam.

The word I used to describe my personal reaction to the film's repetitive and lengthy depiction of a mental retard was "harrowing" and that should have indicated to Ms Galea-Curmi the fact that I am very sensitive to the suffering of others.

According to Ms Galea-Curmi, my use of the term mental retard "reveals a mentality outdated by no fewer than three decades..." In my review I used that term twice and the first time it was in inverted commas which, Ms Galea-Curmi should have realised, meant that I was directly quoting the film's dialogue. However, I am not the only one to use this term.

America is the home of political correctness but in reviewing the film, leading American film critic James Beardinelli (http://movie-reviews.colussus.net) repeatedly referred to Sam as "a mental retard".

The New York Times is so obsessed with PC that in film reviews it precedes the name of actors, directors, etc., with "Mr". Yet in that paper's review (December 28, 2001) of I Am Sam the heading reads: "A Retarded Man Tries To Keep His Child." And it's written in big, bold lettering.

In the Financial Times (May 9, 2002), British film critic Nigel Andrews started his reviews as follows: "Meanwhile, I am staring at an e-mail from a disability charity ordering me not to use the term retard in my review, the film's term for its hero, since it is offensive. Here is what is offensive..."

Andrews then goes to give a list of what is offensive but, unfortunately, I do not have the space to quote it in its entirety. So I will limit myself to quoting one reference to what is offensive: "Movies that use emotions - weeping, laughing, loving the shining faces of little tots - as a means of decimating the spectator's own mental age and corralling him into intellectual surrender."

Beardinelli is more specific: "Despite the high profile nature of the cast, I had the feeling that I was watching one of those made-for-TV weepers that show with alarming regularity on cable TV's Lifetime Network... this is pure soap opera."

Referring to the film's director, Beardinelli stated: "She is clearly relying upon audiences being swept away on a tide of emotion so overwhelming that concerns about the intelligence and logic of the movie become irrelevant."