A Negative Representation of Mental Illness...

Girl, Interrupted

This film is about Kaysen's 18-month stay at a mental institution. Although it has had a lot of positive comments on how it makes mental illnesses seem positive, I think it doesn't necessarily give a negative representation but glamorises mental health. 

Trailer

The hospital in my opinion seems more like a summer camp, which isn't a true representation of what hospitals a like, especially ones that help people in the situation that these characters are in. In the trailer, you can see the girls doing lots of fun, rebellious things, it would be unusual for any hospital to let them get up to the things I do, so therefore it makes these characters look cool, which in some ways glamorises the mental illnesses they have, because people may aspire to be like them. This representation changes the way sufferers are treated in society. 

Shutter Island

This film is about a man (Teddy Daniels), who investigates a psychiatric facility on Shutter Island. In my opinion, this film is a melodramatic exaggeration of mental health and gives a very negative representation of it.

Trailer

In the trailer, it shows a mental institute with violent characters in it, who suffer from some sort of mental illness, making them look extremely dangerous, scary and evil, which is not a true interpretation of people with mental illnesses. This would make the audience think this is what everybody suffering is like, when it's not like that at all. The film is outdated; Shutter Island is an imitation or caricature of mental hospitals in the 50's and 60's, where many chronically ill patients suffered their life with filth and mistreatment. By using an outdated version of mental institutions, it makes the audience think things like this still go on and that these people should be feared, shunned or confined. Although the character 'Teddy' played by Leonardo DiCaprio is appealing and empathetic, the film shows a bipolar mother killing her children and hospital patients who are gruesome people. This is not the representation I want to convey in my short film, I am hoping to show a more truthful image of somebody with a mental illness, and for people to understand them and be more sympathetic.