My eldest child is in her second year at a local college. She is minoring in psychology and majoring in art, planning to be an art therapist.
One of her assignments for her abnormal psych course was to watch an {obscure film} portraying mental illness and write about it.
After scouring the Internet for a film that didn’t make a top ten list, we landed on No Letting Go.
It was not a good film by any standard.
The plot is about a young boy from age 10-16 or so, and his family navigating his bipolar disorder diagnosis. It’s based on a true story.
There are some issues with the film No Letting Go…
The family is rich and white. They have virtually unlimited resources at their fingertips, yet it takes them years to get a good diagnosis and the help the boy needs.
The father in the movie seems clueless about the needs of his family.
The therapist and family are reluctant to try medication.
It’s way past worrying about stigma. The family has lost friends, family, all dignity and respect of the community. The son has been expelled from schools for erratic and volatile behavior. Shouldn’t they try anything that could help at some point?
The family is all but destroyed before they seek help via a remote wilderness camp for boys with mental illnesses where he is locked away for months.
It’s based on a true story and shows the stigma and reluctance of most of us to admit there’s even a problem.
Most of the time, when someone with a mental illness is portrayed in creative media, they’re shown as simply melodramatic, glamorous, shallow, selfish. Despite numerous resources (because they’re almost always wealthy and white) and flippant family and friends who are mostly clueless what the person needs, these characters somehow are able to still lead a semblance of a normal life or self-medicate and push through admirably.
A study conducted by the National Mental Health Association (NMHA) found that 70 percent of the public gets their information about mental health from the TV, 58 percent from newspapers, 51 percent from television news, 34 percent from news magazines and 25 percent from the internet.
Stereotypes lead to stigma, which has harmful effects on many individuals:
- Discourage people from getting the help they need
- Make recovery more difficult because people feel less confident
- Promote discrimination in the workplace, school, or any social situation
- Cause isolation because of fear
- Negatively impact friends, family, and relationships
- Create the view that those who have a mental health problem are outsiders
- Damage self-image
- Mental illness correlations with violence
That is not the reality of mental illness.
And there are so many films glorifying addiction, substance abuse, eating disorders and dysfunctional relationships. While we may see a bit of ourselves in those, they’re too brief and shallow to be diagnosable and representative of mental illness.
Many films blur abuse, addiction, personality and mood disorders, and mental illness. The producers, writers, and directions either don’t care for accuracy, don’t have enough time to explore the issues in a couple hours, or didn’t do any research at all.
Mental Illness Portrayed in Film
Creative drama is drawn to the complexity and fragility of the mind – but mainstream entertainment still demands a snappy fix.
“Crazy” or “mad” characters are often personified as evil, anti-heroes, often masked or disfigured to ramp up the shock effect – like in slasher horror films.
Is it mental illness, the devil or demons, society, trauma, addiction, bad parenting, or what?
Western culture has been defined by films like Psycho, Sibyl, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, The Shining, Halloween, and Mad to Be Normal.
Inside Out is a great film showing emotions and mental health.
It’s interesting to see other cultural views like in A Page of Madness.
Some films on the list are hard to categorize or portray multiple issues. Of course, these are fictional characters or only loosely based on real events and people.
Borderline Personality Disorder
One Hour Photo
Single White Female
Fatal Attraction
The Good Son
Ingrid Goes West
Margot at the Wedding
Mad Love
Falling Down
Shame
Postcards from the Edge
White Oleander
Mommie Dearest
Gaslight
The Rose
Gia
Bipolar Disorder
Homeland (Dramatic TV Series)
The Other Half
Touched with Fire
Silver Linings Playbook
Of Two Minds
Helen
Poppy Shakespeare
Infinitely Polar Bear
Depression
Perks of Being a Wallflower
Garden State
It’s Kind of a Funny Story
The Skeleton Twins
Melancholia
Prozac Nation
Little Miss Sunshine
Leaving Las Vegas
Augusta, Gone
Schizophrenia
Angel at My Table
Lars and the Real Girl – Schizoid Personality Disorder
A Beautiful Mind
The Soloist
Some Voices
Unsound (Short Film)
Benny and Joon
Black Swan – Psychosis
The Neon Demon – Psychosis
Maniac
Shutter Island
The Fisher King
PTSD
Jacob’s Ladder
Call Me Crazy
Martha Marcy May Marlene
The Deer Hunter
Rachel Getting Married
Dissociative Identity Disorder
Girl, Interrupted
Welcome to Me
Frankie & Alice
Fight Club
Sybil
The Three Faces of Eve
Psycho
Anxiety Disorder
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Analyze This and Analyze That
What About Bob?
The King’s Speech
Rain Man
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder
The Aviator
Contamination (short film)
As Good as It Gets
Grey Gardens
Hello, My Name Is Doris
Matchstick Men
I’m sure there are other films. This is not an exhaustive list. But some films gloss over, make fun of, glorify, or criminalize mental illness. We live in a society that is unhealthy and loves to portray us vs. them. Most media doesn’t offer families or relationship story lines of love, health, unity. It doesn’t sell.
Do movies promote or reflect a heightened public awareness of mental health?
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