The Midway Point (2024)

-Written by Edmund Robertson. 

Set against the backdrop of a typical American high school, Writer-Director Lucca Vieira’s coming-of-age drama The Midway Point tells a tale of two unlikely paths crossing at a seminal moment in teenage life. The film mainly centers on Jake (Sean Ryan Fox), a socially anxious high school student on the autism spectrum whose ambitions to get into college to study art and animation are challenged by his difficulty to maintain good grades. After escaping a difficult algebra test, he soon finds himself befriending Alice (Catharine Daddario), a fellow classmate recovering from a bad breakup. The two teens end up spending more time with each other over the course of the following days, but everything changes when Alice coaxes Jake into intimacy.

As someone on the autism spectrum, I tend to notice a troubling trend in media centered around autistic youth in which the worries of the parents and/or guardians of neurodivergent children would be emphasized more than the feelings of the actual child. Fortunately, this film stays firmly centered on Jake’s perspective throughout its 87-minute runtime, and its focus on the neurodivergent experience echoes a lot of my own feelings during my high school life as well. I found myself relating especially heavily to his struggle to enter conversations as his anxiety leaves him stuck watching other people talk, which is a situation that I have found myself in countless times. Despite such details feeling very true to life, I still can’t help but notice that Jake’s life before meeting Alice is depicted as being defined solely by emptiness and disappointment, only making passing reference to his art and interest in film as being a source of joy for him. With that said, I feel like The Midway Point could have done more to illustrate Jake’s inner world early on so that he isn’t solely a tragic figure trudging his way through adversity.

While The Midway Point could benefit from being more dynamic in depicting Jake’s internal emotions, the film manages to make some pretty inspired decisions when presenting how Jake responds to his new relationship with Alice. One scene that takes place at a house party that Alice brings Jake to utilizes tighter camera shots to emphasize the overstimulation and nervousness that Jake feels while walking through a loud and alienating environment. The claustrophobia of this scene acts as an indication that while Alice is successfully taking Jake out of his comfort zone, she might not be fully equipped to put his feelings and needs into consideration as further evidenced when she calls him ‘cute’ after getting high. While that would normally be taken as a compliment, the way that Alice delivers that statement brings to mind how neurotypicals often infantilize autistic people when they don’t want to make the effort to understand them.

Though the film doesn’t go as far as specifying whether or not Jake has accommodations provided to him in school, the teachers at his school prove to be generally supportive of him in the end, helping him realize the importance of enjoying your youth while it lasts as both him and Alice work to forge a more meaningful relationship with each other. While the plot may have a few corny trappings of typical high school romance stories, The Midway Point still proves to be a decent effort in regards to its portrayal of autism and its universal message of self-acceptance.

Written & Directed by Luccia Vieira.

Starring Sean Ryan Fox, Catharine Daddario, Thora Birch, Wes Studi, Julie Benz, etc.

7/10 = WATCH IT FOR FREE