Release Date – 28th March 2025, Cert – 12, Run-time – 1 hour 7 minutes, Directors – Steven Eastwood, The Neurocultures Collective
A set of vignettes by neurodivergent artists intersperse to create a portrait of what it’s like to live in the world with neurodivergence.
Whilst creating a storybook one of the central creatives featured in and behind The Stimming Pool describes how the central character has been given “autistic superpowers”. While viewing certain attributes that others, my autistic self included, may see as things that can occasionally hold them back as superpowers is wonderful alone the detail of tackling things such as noise overlap and overload is even more so. It’s a creative way of looking at things and getting across what it’s like to be neurodiverse, but putting a positive spin on it.
As a whole, The Stimming Pool is made to demonstrate what it’s like to be neurodivergent in the world today. Director Steven Eastwood collaborates with a set of creatives known as The Neurocultures Collective to create a set of vignettes each detailing a different aspect of the world as experienced by those at the centre of the film. Whether it be talking about a film – the opening sees a young man called Robin introducing a schlocky B-movie, describing it as “so atrociously bad”, eventually building up to the rest of the documentary – or showing a tracker following someone’s constant eye movements across a video clip of a busy street. The interpretations in the film and what each segment chooses to do is certainly interesting, although there are undeniably some ideas which work better than others.
Less direct moments, experimental doesn’t quite seem like the right word here, don’t always hit the mark meaning that they don’t connect or get across their point as well as others. The general idea behind the film remains intact and it helps to support the moments which don’t click as well, even when the point feels as if it’s been made somewhat early on with the segment continuing for a little while after along the same line. But, there’s enough within The Stimming Pool which clicks and works. Capturing interest through the ways in which the creatives behind the film demonstrate their view of the world to those watching.
While not everything entirely clicks, the most direct and upfront descriptions within The Stimming Pool have a good deal of interest to make for an engaging documentary with a number of likable segments which allow its creatives to shine.
Just A Little Bit Random 