Winona Ryder
Susanna Kaysen
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Jan 14, 2000 · Girl, Interrupted. 125 minutes ‧ R ‧ 2000. Roger Ebert. January 14, 2000. 3 min read. In the spring of 1967, while everyone else in her senior class seems to be making plans for college, Susanna consumes a bottle of aspirin and a bottle of vodka. “My hands have no bones,” she observes.
Girl, Interrupted is a 1999 American biographical psychological drama film written and directed by James Mangold, from a screenplay by Mangold, Lisa Loomer, and Anna Hamilton Phelan, and based on the 1993 memoir of the same name by Susanna Kaysen.
- Introduction
- Borderline Personality Disorder in DSM-5
- The Accuracy of The Depiction
- Psychopathology in Parents
- Risk Factors
- Protective Factors
- Therapeutic Orientation
- Expected Outcome
- Conclusion
- References
James Mangold’s film “The Girl, Interrupted” was based on the autobiographical book by Susanna Kaysen, who spent two years in a psychiatric hospital. This is the story of a fifteen-year-old girl who spent one year in a psychiatric hospital after trying to commit suicide. The film takes place in the 60s in America during the time of the aggravation ...
The diagnosis with which Susanna is put in a psychiatric hospital first appeared in the American Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) in 1980 (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). It belongs to the category of “Personality disorders” — it is a borderline personality disorder. Susanna feels depressed and empty; she experie...
The main character Susanna is in a borderline state and has depression with exogenous causes; the image of the disease can be considered quite realistic. As she remembers herself, “all her life she was like this”: taciturn, not cheerful, she never smiled. Susanna tried to commit suicide by washing down an aspirin with vodka, but she does not admit ...
Symptoms of psychopathology can be traced not only to Susanna but also to her parents. Susanna’s father works in economics, he is a careerist and is often on the road. Her mother is a housewife whose suspiciousness and emotional lability do not allow her to get closer to her daughter. Susanna’s mother is more concerned about the opinions of others ...
The main risk factor was undoubtedly Susannah’s childhood; the viewer learns that after Susanna fell from the crib and broke her leg, her mother began to tie her up. The parents tied the girl to the furniture as a child so that would not fall and hurt herself. When a child is in a forced immobile position for quite a long time, develops a passive a...
Susanna’s mental disorder developed due to a complex interaction of social, psychological, and biological factors. Such events in the girl’s life as graduation from school, not meeting the expectations of teachers and parents, and an affair with a married man contributed to the activation of protective factors. In numerous memoirs of Susanna, one c...
Susanna’s condition was called borderline; the therapy for it included hospitalization, taking medications, attending a course of psychotherapy, and writing a book (journaling). In the treatment course, the girl processes childhood insults, and harmful parental attitudes, learns to control herself, and accepts herself as she is. The therapy aimed t...
Susanna began to go to a therapist actively; every day, she was getting better and better. At the end of the film, she returned home and became “normal” – active and cheerful. The turning point in Susanna’s relationship with the disorder, which increased her chances of recovery, was a combination of different factors. They were the kind attitude of...
The film not only allows reflecting on the psychopathological picture of depression with a predominance of depersonalization and derealization symptoms. It also focuses on the problem of long-term residence of young people in a psychiatric hospital (in the film, during a period of one year). In addition to the actual emotional experiences and disor...
American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders: DSM V. Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Publishers. Chanen, A. M., Nicol, K., Betts, J.K., & Thompson, K. N. (2020). Diagnosis and treatment of borderline personality disorder in young people. Current Psychiatry Reports, 22(25), 114-135. Comer, J.R....
Mar 1, 2012 · Girl Interrupted, released in 1999, is a film portraying a young female in the 1960s struggling with the uncertainty of her own mental illness. With the persuasion of her parents, Susanna Kayson admits herself into a psychiatric institution and is later diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder. From today's perspective, Susanna's illness ...
- Allie Jones, Jenna Smith, Carol Ott
- 2012
These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of Girl Interrupted by James Mangold. The Girl Interrupted Community Note includes chapter-by-chapter summary and analysis, character list, theme list, historical context, author biography and quizzes written by community members like you.
- James Mangold
Summaries. A directionless teenager, Susanna, is rushed to Claymoore, a mental institution, after a supposed suicide attempt. There, she befriends a group of troubled women who deeply influence her life. In 1967, Susanna Kaysen had a headache and chased a bottle of aspirin with a bottle of vodka.
Girl, Interrupted is Susanna Kaysen’s idiosyncratic account of the nearly two years that she spent in a mental institution, after she was “interrupted in the music of being seventeen.”
