Director Harrison Buck’s short documentary Dragon Mom is not the film you expect. It’s a story about a mother named Laura Will, her five-year-old son Alden, and what it takes to fight like hell for a life that looks nothing like what you planned.
Laura is a dragon mom. That’s what they call mothers raising kids with life-limiting conditions. Her five-year-old son Alden lives with polymicrogyria — a rare brain malformation. He has difficulty communicating with his mother about basic things like what he wants or how he’s feeling. So much of the documentary is about Laura learning to read Alden, accepting his condition, and allowing him to live as Alden rather than as a kid with limits.
“Laura is a dragon mom. That’s what they call mothers raising kids with life-limiting conditions.”
When it comes to Alden, Laura lives with an attitude of gratitude and says no to every obstacle in their way. Ironically, it’s the outdoors that becomes Alden’s proving grounds: wide, open, and unpredictable. Their main goal is to give Alden a full range of life’s experiences, and today it’s getting on skis. Not as a metaphor. Actually skiing. It’s a long shot, but Alden’s world doesn’t have to feel so small just because society wasn’t built with him in mind.
Dragon Mom works because director Harrison Buck puts his subject, Laura Will, front and center and lets her tell her own story in a cinéma vérité style. He strips everything away, and this story is all about Laura and Alden. Laura narrates the entire film, and she is remarkably clear-eyed about what it means to be a dragon mom, the challenges that come with the territory, the hard lessons she’s had to learn, and where she finds hope in Alden. This is not a film about hardship. It’s not asking for your sympathy. It’s telling you that you’re not alone.
"…Alden's world doesn't have to feel so small…"
