Borderline Psychological Disorders In The Film Girl Interrupted

The 1999 film girl Interrupted directed by James Mangold staring Winona Ryder and Angelina Jolie, is an adaptation of Susanna Kaysen’s biography, about her experiences at a psychiatric hospital after being diagnosed with Borderline personality disorder in the 1960’s. The film follows the story of a teenage girl named Susanna who is admitted to Claymore hospital after attempting to commit suicide by overdosing on a mixture of aspirin and vodka. The film makes it very clear to the viewer, in more than one scene, that Susanna often questions her diagnosis, in the film’s opening monologue Susanna says, “Have you ever confused a dream with life? Or stolen something when you had the cash? Have you ever been blue? Or thought your train moving while
Maybe it was the sixties or maybe I was just a girl interrupted.” (Wick, Conrad & Mangold, 1999). Susanna also questions who draws the line in the sand, between what is normal or abnormal behavior, does being depressed and losing your identity define someone as having a mental illness? Another scene in the film that expresses Susanna’s doubt about her diagnosis is when she says “are we ever truly crazy or maybe life is . . . crazy is everyone just amplified,” (Wick, Conrad & Mangold, 1999). I believe that Susanna is right in questioning her diagnosis, perhaps she is not “crazy”, after watching the movie I also question whether or not she was properly diagnosed; I believe she is “that girl interrupted” she was not suffering from borderline personality disorder, but rather having a transitory identity crisis, coupled with depression and anxiety caused by the stress in her environment. One must take into consideration that the revolution of sixties was a confusing time, especially for an eighteen year old girl who couldn’t find her place in a “crazy”
Problems within her family and social environment coupled with her role confusion, is causing Susanna psychological dysfunction triggering depression and anxiety, as a result she is expressing BPD like symptoms. In the second scene in the movie the viewer gets to see some of the symptoms caused by her “disorder” since Susanna attempted suicide, we see her strapped to a hospital bed explaining to doctors why she tried to kill herself, “Check my hands there are no bones in it . . . sometimes it’s hard for me to stay in one place,” (Wick, Conrad & Mangold, 1999). In the next scene we see Susanna talking with a therapist, she seems confused and her statements about time and place are strange, she seems to have lost touch with reality, her odd behavior prompts the therapist to ask if she is on drugs, Susanna replies no, when the therapist asked how she is feeling, she finds it hard to explain and replies “I don’t know how I am feeling,” (Wick, Conrad & Mangold,