1 minute read
Psychology in movies and TV
Catherine Eikelbarner
Psychology is in every aspect of our life, so it makes sense that the entertainment industry includes the concept within television shows and movies. Below will include whether these forms of entertainment provide accurate portrayals or if they need significant refinement.
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Fractured
Ray Monroe travels with his wife and daughter when they stop at the gas station. His daughter falls and breaks her arm, leading him to rush her to the hospital. Once they arrive and settle in, Monroe waits for an update on his daughter when the hospital staff reports that no child fitting his daughter’s description came to the hospital.
Monroe then goes on a long journey to figure out what happened to his family and where they went. He suffers from a split in his reality due to experiencing a psychotic outbreak, making him hallucinate conversations with his family, even though he is entirely alone.
According to psychologist Cristina Blanco, a psychotic disorder can create a parallel reality for individuals. It distorts the truth and the scope of the world to cope with the harsh realism reflected in life. This disorder is relatively accurate within the film, as a psychotic break display is clear. However, the film provides a faulty background to the disorder as a break in one’s psyche occurs from anything one perceives as traumatic, not just a violent event.
A Beautiful Mind
Based on the life of mathematician John Forbes Nash, this movie follows Nash’s development of schizophrenia and how it can impact one’s life. The film depicts many signs of the disorder, providing a more accurate depiction of how schizophrenia can manifest within individuals.
Maria Gaglio, in her analysis paper Accuracies and Inaccuracies: Analysis of the portrayal of Schizophrenia in the major motion picture A Beautiful Mind, discusses how the symptoms of schizophrenia are correct in their account, but the recovery period and depiction are entirely inaccurate. A Beautiful Mind may bring forward a greater emphasis on the toll that schizophrenia can have on those diagnosed with the disorder, but the dramatization of electroshock therapy and the actions of those who possess the disorder hinder the validity of the film.
