today's weather: S L I G H T D Y S P H O R I A anxiety : 1
agitation : 2
I like watching movies about disturbed people. A couple of years ago, someone gave me the idea to watch movies like those, identify with the characters and laugh at them. Well, I don't really think it's right to laugh at them, but I get to appreciate something about psychosis.
Movies have a way of making an unfavorable mental state look mysterious, intriguing and dramatic, sometimes even romantic. While I generally dislike how media has helped to sculpt a distorted image (usually negative) of psychological conditions, I quite enjoy watching actors and directors take a crazy person and turn him into a subject of art, skew reality and make people believe it.
Just last night I watched Black Swan. It was weird, but - Bravo, director Darren Aronofsky. Natalie Portman was spectacular in there too as Nina the schizophrenic(?) ballerina.
The other day I watched Donnie Darko. I still didn't get it. I Googled for an explanation but every "explanation" seemed to be stretching it. I don't know what writer/ director Richard Kelly was going for, but I though Jake Gyllenhaal was successfully creepy.
In a little while, I'll be seeing Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange. Ah, Alex Delarge, one of my favorite antiheroes.
Some other "troubled person" performances I've enjoyed:
- Penelope Cruz as passionate, artistic Maria Elena in Vicky Cristina Barcelona. It wasn't stated, but it seemed pretty clear that Maria Elena is bipolar. I think Penelope got an award for that one. Or was it just a nomination? Either way, it means she was good.
- Anthony Hopkins as the sociopathic Hannibal Lecter. Iconic.
- Nicole Kidman as bipolar writer Virginia Woolf in The Hours. Not too flashy, but excellent.
- Angelina Jolie as a beautiful sociopath in Girl, Interrupted. Brittany Murphy and Wynonah Ryder were alright in there too.
- Sienna Miller as Nikki in Alfie. Really cute with bipolar characteristics.
- Jack Nicholson as a psychopath in The Shining (Epic!), in Batman as the Joker and as an obsessive-compulsive romantic in As Good As It Gets.
- And speaking of Batman, I loved Heath Ledger's Joker in The Dark Knight too.
- Vincent D'Onofrio as Pvt. Pyle in Full Metal Jacket.
- Johnny Depp as Sweeney Todd.
- Chiaki Kuriyama as a cute, sociopathic Japanese schoolgirl, Gogo Yubari in Kill Bill. So cute.
- Russel Crowe as a schizophrenic in A Beautiful Mind.
- Christian Bale as a neurotic, obsessive schizo in The Machinist.
- That guy in Perfume: The Story of a Murderer. Another sociopath.
- Brad Pitt as a schizophrenic in 12 Monkeys and a personality fragment in Fight Club.
- Leonardo DiCaprio with a conglomerate of neuroses in The Aviator.
- Edward Norton in Primal Fear, American History X, Fight Club, Hulk, and just about any movie he does. He really good. And he seems to go for characters with psychoses.
- Gwyneth Paltrow in Sylvia. She really turned a colorful character like Sylvia Plath into Sylvia Blah.
- Jim Carrey in The Number 23. His acting was good, but through watching that thriller, I couldn't help thinking he'd suddenly pull a comedic stunt.
- Halle Berry in Gothika. I dunno. Maybe it's because it's a crappy movie.
Anyway, I'm off to watch now.
