SO going back to my research on film and the pitfalls, I've seen a lot of them particularly in modern film. The Shape of Water for example; visually gorgeous and an absolute credit to Guillermo Del Toro's directing, but not great on disability
Like most films, it casts an able bodied actress in a disabled role. This is something incredibly common with films about disabilities. Then there was the link between monsters & disabled characters and a few bits of dialogue that were iffy; it cleaned up at the Oscars though.
While I recognise that of course maybe Sally Hawkins was the best for the job, I think there needs to be more consideration for the stories of disabled people and how they're portrayed on screen
Often we are reduced to Monsters or charity cases. According to one narrative theory of the "adjustment drama" : If disabled characters dont adapt to 'normality', they are removed from narratives; which is commonly done through killing them off
Its an angle I'm exploring at the moment and obviously my research is still quite new. But I've found that there is a certain formula around disability that many follow. Much of it includes death, and there are little to no disabled history films despite some interesting moments!
