A writer (Paul Rudd) retires after a personal tragedy and becomes a disabled teen's caregiver. When the two embark on an impromptu road trip, their ability to cope is tested as they start to understand the importance of hope and friendship in this 2016 Dramedy. Base on a novel call “ The Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving”, by Jonathan Evison.
The Fundamentals of Caring contains examples of:
- Deadpan Snarker: Trevor speaks almost solely in this.
- Disappeared Dad: Trevor's father abandoned his son and wife when Trevor was diagnosed.
- Inspirationally Disadvantaged: Played with. While everyone involved has some learning experience over the course of the road trip, most of that is incidental to Trevor's disability. His own journey has more to do with getting away temporarily from his overbearing mother than his disability.
- My Beloved Smother: Played with Trevor's mom, Elsa. She is very protective of him, but it's not unjustified as he could really die if left in inexperienced hands; she is against the road trip that is the main focus of the movie, but again, Trevor has a difficult condition and hardly ever left his home — which the movie implies was mostly his own choice. Once Ben explains why the trip would be good for Trevor, she accepts with a reasonable amount of hesitation (which Trevor himself also has right before they leave). She's also rather justified in not wanting Ben to be too close to her son: after all, Ben has just lost his own son and could be using Trevor as some sort of psychological surrogate, and could leave at any moment. Elsa's also shown to interact in a light way with Trevor, sharing his sense of humor, up to a certain extent.
- Lady Swears-a-Lot: Dot, whose speech is 90% composed of swearing.
- Road Trip Plot: The group sets out at first for the "World's Deepest Pit" and other roadside attractions, but as they pick up hitchikers and become more adventurous, they add a stop to find Trevor's Disappeared Dad.
- Running Gag: Trevor trying to fool Ben into thinking he’s in mortal peril or dying.
- Another one involves Trevor wanting to use Make Wish Foundation to have Katy Perry give him a blowjob. Ben later roles with it and pretends to have set up the meeting asking Trevor what song he’d like her to sing to him.
