Oscar bait Reader" (2008). In the film "Tropic Thunder" (2008), characters Tugg Speedman (Ben Stiller) and Kirk Lazarus (Robert Downey Jr.) discuss the concept regarding Speedman's former role in the fictional film "Simple Jack", in which Lazarus notes that "you never go full retard", contrasting the Oscar successes of Dustin Hoffman ("Rain Man", 1988) and Tom Hanks ("Forrest Gump", 1994) with Sean Penn's failure to win an award for his role in "I Am Sam" (2001). "Tropic Thunder" received protests from disability rights organisations due to its constant use of the word "retard"; Stiller defended the scene as being intended to lampoon
Forrest Gump New York Times" reviewer Janet Maslin called Gump a "hollow man" who is "self-congratulatory in his blissful ignorance, warmly embraced as the embodiment of absolutely nothing." Marc Vincenti of "Palo Alto Weekly" called the character "a pitiful stooge taking the pie of life in the face, thoughtfully licking his fingers." Bruce Kawin and Gerald Mast's textbook on film history notes that Forrest Gump's dimness was a metaphor for glamorized nostalgia in that he represented a blank slate by which the Baby Boomer generation projected their memories of those events. The film is commonly seen as a polarizing one for audiences,