Retro Review by Allie Chadwick
In her book International Perspectives on Feminism and Sexism in the Film Industry (2020), Dilan Tuysuz argues that the conception of “female madness” in films often involves a “desire for self-destruction” from how these women act without thinking and are controlled by their emotions. Tuysuz also discusses the “seductress female patient stereotype” which usually involves women patients in a psychiatric ward being attracted to their Doctor or to another patient – or, in other cases the film shows their past sexual relationships in a way that portrays the woman as being overly suggestive and promiscuous, caused by their out of control emotional personality. Tuysuz argues that even in movies about mental illness, there is still an element of sexualisation and passive stereotypes surrounding the portrayal of women, and it is interesting to examine these ideas in the 1999 film Girl, Interrupted, wherein eighteen-year-old Susanna Kaysen (the protagonist of the film and author of the memoir it’s based on) does have sexual relations with men while she is in hospital, and her past sexual relationships are discussed by others during her stay.
Girl, Interrupted focusses on the story of Susanna Kaysen (played by Winona Ryder), who, after being submitted to Claymoore, the local psychiatric hospital, finds her way among the other patients. They all have different reasons for being in the ward, but what they have in common is their need for help and support, like anyone who suffers mentally does. In this review, I am going to discuss two particular key scenes that highlight two key themes within the entire film, those being sisterhood and accusations of promiscuity.
The film’s portrayal of the power of sisterhood can be seen acutely in the image above: a snapshot of joy, and collective happiness. Just before this scene occurs, one of the other women in the ward, a childlike schizophrenic named Polly Clark, has a breakdown and is placed in isolation by the ward sisters. Susanna and Lisa (played here by Angelina Jolie) drug the night watch nurse with a sedative and attempt to comfort Polly by singing to her. This, for me, is one of the most powerful scenes in the entire film due to how it is a subtle example of how, despite all of their troubles, women have the ability to fight for each other and to stand together through their darkest times. The use of the soft lighting here emphasises the light atmosphere and the smiles on their faces as they find a communion in their attempt to support each other. It is a scene that inspires both tears and smiles from the audience. Up until this point in the film, there has been a lot of tension between Susanna and the other patients, as they begin to get to know each other, but in this scene, there is no tension, but just a desire to show solidarity with their fellow women. This is an incredibly important concept to show due to how there is a common concept surrounding on-screen femininity (Laura Mulvey’s idea of “The Male Gaze”) that women are there to be passive objects to be gazed upon for a male’s sexual gratification. In this scene, these women are not there to be gazed upon as sexualised objects but are simply there to advocate for each other.
Another scene worth considering is that of when Susanna is called into a therapy session, where she is in the process of exploring what is happening to her and why she is in hospital. There is the initial awkwardness of the session, shown in the empirical space between the patient and the therapist, but even more interesting is a particular line of questioning from Susanna. This scene takes place straight after the aforementioned late-night scene, so when Susanna walks in, the therapist (Vanessa Redgrave) named Dr. Sonia Wick comments on how tired she looks. When Susanna tells her how she and Lisa sang to Polly all night, Sonia asks her whether she had many girlfriends before coming to the hospital. When Susanna says no, Sonia then asks whether many of her past friends were men. Susanna, throughout this scene and in the film so far, has been very defensive towards the staff of the hospital, so curtly asks “Does it say in there that I’m promiscuous?”, which is Susanna referring to her medical notes that Sonia has in front of her. Susanna then questions “how many guys would I have to sleep with to be considered promiscuous?”, which she then compares that number to that of men, with the number of women being considerably lower. I think this is an incredibly fascinating piece of dialogue that perfectly highlights Tuysuz’s argument of the mentally ill female being shown as being overly sexually promiscuous and seductive, due to how they are not in control of themselves and their emotions, especially compared to that of men.
In my opinion, these are exceedingly paramount themes within feminist film studies which need more attention and scholarship, and this film has is pivotal example regarding the portrayal of women who experience mental illness.
May 10-16 is National Mental Health Awareness Week in the UK! You can donate to the Mental Health Foundation here.