The Boy in the Plastic Bubble

Tod Lubitch was born with a severely weakened immune system, which means he cannot survive contact with everyday germs. He lives at home with his parents in a sealed, sterile room, eats specially prepared food, and knows other people only through gloved hands. As he grows into a teenager, he wants more from the world outside, and his parents enrol him at the local school, where he attends in a protective suit resembling a spacesuit. There he falls for his neighbour Gina Biggs, and must weigh his isolation against the risk that comes with leaving it.

The Boy in the Plastic Bubble is a 1976 American television drama directed by Randal Kleiser, from a screenplay by Douglas Day Stewart. It was the first feature-length film Kleiser directed, ahead of Grease, The Blue Lagoon and Flight of the Navigator. John Travolta plays Tod, with Glynnis O'Connor as Gina, and Robert Reed and Diana Hyland as his parents; the credited cast runs to 25 names.

The film was released in November 1976 and runs 96 minutes. Audiences rate it modestly: 5.8 out of 10 on IMDb from around 6,000 votes, and 5.6 out of 10 on TMDB from a much smaller sample of 121. The larger IMDb vote count gives that score somewhat more weight, while the two roughly agree on the film's standing.