Naoki Higashida’s bestselling memoir The Reason I Jump offered a groundbreaking first-person account of life as a non-speaking autistic child. Using imaginative interviews and dramatizations, this Sundance Award-winning adaptation blends Naoki’s revelatory insights—written when he was just 13—with remarkable accounts of five other young non-verbal people with autism around the world. Taken together, these impressionistic and firsthand experiences open a window into an intense and overwhelming, but often joyful, sensory universe—leading us to Naoki’s core message: not being able to speak does not mean there is nothing to say.

Featuring a special bonus Q&A with director Jerry Rothwell, recorded at Hot Docs 2020.

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