<em>Mighty Movie Podcast:</em> A Beautiful, If Somewhat Perplexed, Mind: Max Mayer on <em>Adam</em>

Turning out to be a rough month for romance, isn't it? Adam, the new drama directed by Max Mayer and starring Hugh Dancy and Rose Byrne, doesn't skip back and forth within its time line or offer the narrative flamboyancy of (500) Days of Summer, but that doesn't mean that the course of love is going to be any smoother.

You see, the titular Adam (Dancy) has Asperger's Syndrome, a condition characterized as a kind of autism, but not quite as severe. In Adam's case, that works out to him being rather brilliant in the fields of technology and astronomy, but at a total loss when it comes to simple human interaction. His new neighbor, Beth (Byrne), just starting to make her own way in the world, takes it upon herself to help Adam get up to speed with this whole relating to people thing. Simple friendship, however, soon blooms into full-on romance, and Beth and Adam -- both of whom have other problems to contend with -- find themselves in territory where neither person may be able to provide the support that the other needs.

If you've watched Alias or The West Wing, or you're well-immersed in the New York theater world, you may have noticed director Max Mayer's name. He's making his feature debut with Adam, and was happy to talk about its inception, how the Method tends to break down when one of your actors is playing autistic, and the dark, dark reality of filmmakers forced to outsource their nature shots to Canada while decent, hardworking U.S. wildlife goes unemployed. Here's the interview:

More Crazy Love on MMP:
Marc Webb on (500) Days of Summer
Stephan Elliott on Easy Virtue
Paul Morrison on Little Ashes

More MMP on HuffPost:
Armando Iannucci on In the Loop
Lynn Shelton on Humpday
Amat Escalante on Los Bastardos

Check out the Mighty Movie Podcast homepage.