Payal Khatore Blog Post 1 Mental health issues rarely receive media attention and when popular movies and television shows do choose to focus on them, the portrayals are extremely problematic. People suffering from mental health issues are usually seen as side characters, often portrayed in stereotypical ways. In lieu of this, a show like Bojack Horseman can be seen as a significant step in destigmatisation of mental illness in television shows. In an article for Bustle, highlighting the show’s nuanced depiction of mental illness, Courtney Enlow writes, “It's important because it shows people with mental illness as complex, relatable humans (and horses, and cats, and birds, and dogs) — and that makes a difference.” She also discusses the importance of having a protagonist (along with most other characters), suffering from mental health issues in a realistic way, despite it being a comedy show.   While the show deserves to be applauded for this portrayal, a rec...

Trisha Malhotra Paranoia keeps its sufferers in-check. Convinced of being under the presence of a constant threat, people paranoid personality disorder are extremely mistrustful, experience high anxiety and have far-reaching delusions. On the other hand, people with schizotypal personality disorder, in addition to being paranoid, are eccentric, isolated and experience delusions and periods of psychosis. Travis Bickle from Martin Scorcese's Taxi Driver (1976) is an embodiment of the onset and development of schizotypal symptoms. Travis, an ex-marine, now works as a taxi driver in New York. He lives an isolated life and struggles with insomnia. Although shy in the company of his loud-mouthed acquaintances, he has strong opinions about what is right and wrong for improving the lives of those around him. He grows frustrated with the world he inhabits "wishing a real rain will come and wash all the scum of the streets." His night-shifts around the streets of New York lea...

Trisha Malhotra Based on a memoir by writer Susanna Kaysen, "Girl, Interrupted (1999)" speaks volumes about her struggle to accept her own mental illness in a society that severely delineated the 'normal' from the 'deviant'. Susanna (Winona Ryder) is admitted to a mental hospital 'McLean' following a suicide attempt where she encounters a pathological liar, a paranoid schizophrenic, an extreme bulimic and a charming sociopath (Angelina Jolie) among others. Being diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder, Susanna's stay is forcibly extended from a few weeks to 18 months.  Mental hospitals, even in the 20th century, were notorious for poor living conditions, a lack of hygiene, the ill-treatment and abuse of their patients and overcrowding. Many of these problems were well-depicted in the film: patients were pushed around by the McLean staff if they 'misbehaved' which included their benevolent refusal to shower or eat their meals. I...

Dikshita On the 10th of August, 2018 Netflix aired its new documentary ‘Afflicted’ that filmed 7 individuals as they battled their way through chronic illnesses like Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Electro-Hypersensitivity and Mold Sensitivity. The seven people who were filmed are, Jamison, a Californian, who is diagnosed with Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME), a disease that causes extreme fatigue exhaustion, sleep abnormalities and pain. He has not left his bed in two years and doesn’t have a definite treatment plan that is helping his condition. Then there is Carmen from Virginia, with Electro-Hypersensitivity, making it impossible for her to live near any sort of radiations. Bekah Fly, with Mold Sensitivity, forcing her to live in a van on a deserted land outside the states; Jake with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and other undiagnosed diseases that keep him in pain and alter his personality to an extent that he can’t function on his own. Star with multiple autoimmune diseases like Lyme In...

Trisha Malhotra In 1917, Sigmund Freud published a seminal essay scaling the difference between 'mourning' the loss of a loved one and 'melancholia' as a debilitating pervasive condition. He wrote, " The melancholic displays something else besides which is lacking in mourning—an extraordinary diminution in self-regard, an impoverishment of ego on a grand scale... completed by sleeplessness, a refusal to take nourishment, and by an overcoming of the instinct which compels every living thing to cling to life." The word  melancholia  probably for the first time referenced what is known today as depression .  Using the title as a reference to the Freudian definition, Lars von Trier has crafted what is described as “a beautiful film about the end of the world ” . His movie Melancholia (2011) is a creative exploration of the nature of depression from the perspectives of two women- clinically depressed Justine and her sister Claire. In this post, I explor...