I am Sam is a film about a man named Sam Dawson (Sean Penn) who has a mental disability that constrains his mental capacity to that of a seven-year-old. He has a seven-year-old daughter named Lucy (Dakota Fanning) who turns eight in the middle of the movie, causing a catalyst of events that lead to Sam losing custody. In the film, Sam has a strict routine that he must adhere to or else his whole schedule gets off track. He does not like change and cannot or will not adapt to it easily. This was best illustrated when Lucy wanted to go to a new dinner instead of IHOP, their regular Wednesday outing. Sam orders French pancakes like the ones from IHOP and the waitress says they don’t have that, which causes Sam to start yelling “the customers always right!” multiple times. Exemplifying how Sam has a routine and makes the same choices as to not confuse himself and make his life much simpler. Sam also does a lot of repetition throughout the film, sometimes as a form to remember things and sometimes in excitement. For instance, when he is working at Starbucks he always says what the customer ordered and “good choice, very good choice”. It takes him longer to do simple math which was best shown when he was paying for Lucy’s shoes and it took him more time to count out the money. He has problems pronouncing long, complex words and uses a lot of Beetles references to understand things. Sam also has a tic with …show more content…
Additionally, people with mental disabilities are not all that different from people without disabilities. They have dreams and aspirations, they have families that they love, and they face hardships that the work tirelessly to overcome. I am Sam makes one reflect on how fortunate one is and how one should not take anything for granted when someone else wishes to have the life one is