Being Heumann opens with the guitar strings of Iggy Pop's "The Passenger." It's an ironically apt choice by co-writer and director Siân Heder, as the subject of this biopic, Judith "Judy" Heumann (Ruth Madeley), was quite literally unable to be a passenger on most forms of public transportation. After contracting polio at a young age, Heumann used a wheelchair for the rest of her life. Yet she only came to view that reality as a disability when society's infrastructure made it impossible for her to function as a full participant within it. Repeatedly denied access to opportunities afforded to others, she was often treated as more of a liability than a person. Most infamously, she was refused a teaching license because officials doubted she could assist students during a fire, reducing her to a perceived safety hazard rather than recognizing her hopes, ambitions, and humanity.

Like many civil rights leaders of the turbulent 1960s and 1970s, Heumann was incapable of accepting "no" for an answer. In fact, outright rejection might have been preferable to the indifference she encountered. People walked past her on streets designed almost exclusively for those with fully functioning legs. We first meet Judy leading a protest outside an inaccessible federal building, demanding the implementation of Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, which would prohibit discrimination against disabled individuals and require public spaces to become accessible through accommodations such as ramps, curb cuts, and larger entrances. Her frustration eventually boils over, prompting her to wheel herself into the middle of a busy street and flip off passing motorists in a desperate effort to force attention onto her cause.

Whether or not it was the right tactic, that sort of brashness is precisely what makes Judy such a compelling protagonist. While she was a pioneering activist whose goals are unquestionably noble, she is also foul-mouthed, abrasive, and sometimes stubborn to her own detriment. Madeley, herself a disabled performer, brings considerable warmth and gravity to the role. I mean this as a genuine compliment: it is a quintessential biopic performance, disappearing into the character while grounding a larger-than-life historical figure in recognizable human qualities.

Unfortunately, that restraint is one of the film's rarer qualities. Heder is often too eager to indulge in crowd-pleasing earnestness. This is a film designed to make audiences smile, applaud, and leave the theater, or living room given Apple's streaming distribution, with a renewed sense of inspiration. What it is less interested in doing is wrestling with the messier contradictions of its characters or finding new approaches to the well-worn conventions of the historical drama. This tendency is hardly new for Heder, who won the Academy Award for Best Picture with CODA in 2021 using much the same formula.

Much of the film's broadness stems from Mark Ruffalo's performance as Joseph Califano, the United States Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare. As in Mickey 17 and Poor Things, Ruffalo once again transforms a powerful, arrogant man into something approaching a cartoon buffoon. Califano embodies the familiar politician archetype: saying all the right things publicly while avoiding meaningful action behind closed doors. His primary concern is that signing Section 504 would leave him only sixty days to implement its provisions, as though American history was not filled with examples of seemingly impossible accomplishments becoming reality through sheer will. Califano worries about the consequences for his career, while Judy and her organization are focused on something more fundamental: securing rights that every other American already enjoys.

Eventually, Judy decides to force the issue by organizing a sit-in at the San Francisco office of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. Dozens of disabled activists occupy an upper floor of the building, refusing to leave until Section 504 is signed into law. To Heder and co-writer Rebekah Taussig's credit, these protesters are not depicted as a uniformly virtuous collective holding hands and singing songs. There is a makeshift love tent in the hallway, disagreements over strategy, and constant debate about the risks and potential rewards of their actions. For as admirable as it is that Heder attempts to juggle such a large ensemble within a confined setting, the task becomes considerably easier when many of the characters are drawn in broad strokes. There is the irritable one, the funny one, the voice of reason, and so on.

This is the kind of movie where a pivotal breakthrough occurs because one of Califano's previously overlooked secretaries suggests that the government should start listening to disabled activists. While there is truth in the idea that many problems could be solved through empathy and genuine listening, the moment feels overly tidy within the confines of a dramatic feature. Nothing about building this movement was simple or convenient, requiring extraordinary perseverance, sacrifice, and confrontation. It is not unreasonable to ask that a cinematic retelling embrace some of that same complexity.

This review was originally published from the world premiere at the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival. Apple TV will release Being Heumann in select theaters on November 06th, followed by its streaming premiere on November 13th.