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Analysis in one flew over the cuckoo's nest
One flew over the cuckoo's nest movie analysis
Critical analysis of one flew over the cuckoo's nest
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To be successful, a visual or oral text must have lovable characters. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest guides the audience through the unforgettable story of the protagonist, Randle McMurphy. McMurphy is an incarcerated convict who pleads insanity with the hope of getting transferred to a mental ward. Unbeknownst to McMurphy, the cosy prison time he imagined turns out to be not only a physical prison but also a prison of the mind. The devilish antagonist, Nurse Ratched, rules this ‘prison' with an iron fist, but the newly admitted McMurphy soon opposes her. McMurphy and Nurse Ratched fight for influence over the ward's patients; however, during McMurphy's battle with Nurse Ratched, he feels within himself a strong emotion towards the ward's …show more content…
patients. Compassion, a form of love, is an emotion that, as a criminal, McMurphy has never expected to experience. Feeling trapped and helpless, Billy Bibbit has attempted to take his life a multitude of times.
Billy's mother has led a controlling relationship and has consequently sent her son through the fiery depths of depression, and, worst of all, she has delivered her son to the devil herself, Nurse Ratched. We view Nurse Ratched as the devil because of her oppressive rule, and her intentions in ‘curing' those under her care. To the audience, it is apparent that her intentions are not that of a nurse, but of a power-crazy ruler. Milos Forman epitomises this devilish theme by styling Nurse Ratched's hair with devil horns. As the audience learns of Billy's maltreatment, we instinctively feel love for this abused and oppressed character. When Billy meets McMurphy, he is amazed to see the confidence in which McMurphy acts. These actions include defying the devil (Nurse Ratched) in her realm of the ward. McMurphy and Billy grow a relationship where McMurphy develops Billy's confidence by displaying acts of defiance, and with words of support, "What are you doin' here? You oughta be out in a convertible bird-doggin' chicks and bangin' beavers." To Billy, this statement increases his confidence, but to the audience, it draws in more of our love for Billy as we cannot help but feel compassion for what he could have been given: a loving mother. Our love for Billy not only comes from compassion but with his development, much like a mother watching their child grow and develop. In Billy's …show more content…
case, this is his development of confidence, and when he reaches the pinnacle of his confidence, we as an audience cannot help but feel pride. However, when Nurse Ratched learns that she has lost control over one of her victims, she exploits Billy's relationship with his mother to bring him under her reign again. Billy, after experiencing this new confident and joyful side of life, does not believe he can go back to his past self. Billy takes the opportunity to take his life, sending McMurphy and the audience into a violent rage toward Nurse Ratched. Love is a strong emotion that can connect to everyone. Billy, as a lovable character, sends us on an emotional rollercoaster of sadness, compassion, pride, and anger. These emotions are all derived from our love of Billy, and this produces strong bonds between the audience and this character. Strong bonds immerse the audience into the film and increase audience engagement through attachment, emotional triggering, and relatability. These features combine to increase the quality of entertainment for the audience and, therefore, produce a successful film. Although he is the size of a giant, Chief Bromden cannot help but feel tiny because of the belittlement he was subjected to, resulting in his admission to the ward.
Being so belittled, Chief becomes withdrawn. With his lack of confidence, he has refrained from verbal communication and admitted himself into a mental ward. Chief's silence causes the other ward patients to view him as no more than the broom with which he sweeps. We feel love towards Chief because we feel compassion towards his vulnerable mentality. When McMurphy first introduces himself to Chief, he has no propositions and communicates with Chief with the same respect that is demanded of any man. McMurphy's teaching furthers this when the two play basketball. This causes Chief to no longer feel belittled as McMurphy, without any propositions, acknowledges him as a peer. Chief's liking for McMurphy is evident when he speaks to McMurphy while they are awaiting their shock therapy. This symbolises that Chief has grown in his confidence thanks to the support from McMurphy. Similar to Billy, we feel pride when we hear Chief come 'out of his shell' by saying his first words to McMurphy. However, Chief confesses to McMurphy that he is still not confident enough to leave the ward, but this soon changes when he observes McMurphy take the final step of courage and sacrifices his life to check on the well-being of Billy, who had just committed suicide. This display by McMurphy gives Chief the confidence he needs to deem
himself ready for the outside world. However, following the commotion over Billy's suicide, McMurphy is taken away. Chief waits for McMurphy to return. However, when he does return, he returns as a mindless lobotomized patient. Chief takes the step of ultimate courage and euthanises his friend -- a step which is humane, but still emotionally stirring. In McMurphy's name, he then takes the hydrotherapy unit and, as dreamed and prophesied by McMurphy, he rips it from its plumbing and smashes it through the window for a grand escape. We sympathise with Chief because of his belittled past, but when we watch Chief start interacting with people again and 'coming out of his shell,' we cannot help but feel proud of his development. For the audience this is relatable. Personally, in the first years of high school, I was unconfident. However, given time and a supportive environment, such like the environment McMurphy produces, I grew to trust my surroundings. For the audience, they have each had this experience to differing degrees, and this relatability grows our love for this character, as we can not only sympathise but empathise. Chief is a very lovable character with whom we have all enjoyed connecting, a feature that engages the audience in an unforgettable experience that helps us to remember the moving acts that these characters undertake. These moving acts are taken away by the audience and incorporated into their everyday kindness for others to create not only a successfully entertaining film but one with a successful message. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is filled with social acts of love and kindness, that are reinforced by the lovable characters to whom we become attached. These characters immerse us into our world, which enables us to relate to their situations and help us to understand people in our environment. People like Billy, Chief, McMurphy, and Nurse Ratched are found in our environment to differing degrees, and Forman's film gives us the tools we need to sympathise and understand these people in our society. This film is not only successfully entertaining but is also successful in the powerful and socially responsible message with which it sends its viewers home.
The novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey tells a story of Nurse Ratched, the head nurse of a mental institution, and the way her patients respond to her harsh treatment. The story is told from the perspective of a large, Native-American patient named Bromden; he immediately introduces Randle McMurphy, a recently admitted patient, who is disturbed by the controlling and abusive way Ratched runs her ward. Through these feelings, McMurphy makes it his goal to undermine Ratched’s authority, while convincing the other patients to do the same. McMurphy becomes a symbol of rebellion through talking behind Ratched’s back, illegally playing cards, calling for votes, and leaving the ward for a fishing trip. His shenanigans cause his identity to be completely stolen through a lobotomy that puts him in a vegetative state. Bromden sees McMurphy in this condition and decides that the patients need to remember him as a symbol of individuality, not as a husk of a man destroyed by the
In my opinion the main theme of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is conformity. The patients at this mental institution, or at least the one in the Big Nurse’s ward, find themselves on a rough situation where not following standards costs them many privileges being taken away. The standards that the Combine sets are what makes the patients so afraid of a change and simply conform hopelessly to what they have since anything out of the ordinary would get them in trouble. Such conformity is what Mc Murphy can not stand and makes him bring life back to the ward by fighting Miss Ratched and creating a new environment for the patients. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest represents a rebellion against the conformity implied in today’s society.
Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest explores the dysfunctions and struggles of life for the patients in a matriarch ruled mental hospital. As told by a schizophrenic Native American named Chief Bromden, the novel focuses primarily on Randle McMurphy, a boisterous new patient introduced into the ward, and his constant war with the Big Nurse Ratched, the emasculating authoritarian ruler of the ward. Constricted by the austere ward policy and the callous Big Nurse, the patients are intimidated into passivity. Feeling less like patients and more like inmates of a prison, the men surrender themselves to a life of submissiveness-- until McMurphy arrives. With his defiant, fearless and humorous presence, he instills a certain sense of rebellion within all of the other patients. Before long, McMurphy has the majority of the Acutes on the ward following him and looking to him as though he is a hero. His reputation quickly escalates into something Christ-like as he challenges the nurse repeatedly, showing the other men through his battle and his humor that one must never be afraid to go against an authority that favors conformity and efficiency over individual people and their needs. McMurphy’s ruthless behavior and seemingly unwavering will to protest ward policy and exhaust Nurse Ratched’s placidity not only serves to inspire other characters in the novel, but also brings the Kesey’s central theme into focus: the struggle of the individual against the manipulation of authoritarian conformists. The asylum itself is but a microcosm of society in 1950’s America, therefore the patients represent the individuals within a conformist nation and the Big Nurse is a symbol of the authority and the force of the Combine she represents--all...
People often find themselves as part of a collective, following society's norms and may find oneself in places where feeling constrained by the rules and will act out to be unconstrained, as a result people are branded as nuisances or troublemakers. In the novel One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, the author Ken Kesey conveys the attempt McMurphy makes to live unconstrained by the authority of Nurse Ratched. The story is very one sided and helps create an understanding for those troublemakers who are look down on in hopes of shifting ingrained ideals. The Significance of McMurphy's struggles lies in the importance placed on individuality and liberty. If McMurphy had not opposed fear and autocratic authority of Nurse Ratched nothing would have gotten better on the ward the men would still feel fear. and unnerved by a possibility of freedom. “...Then, just as she's rolling along at her biggest and meanest, McMurphy steps out of the latrine ... holding that towel around his hips-stops her dead! ” In the novel McMurphy shows little signs like this to combat thee Nurse. His defiance of her system included
Some people are what you may call "normal", some are depressed, some are mentally ill, and some are just plain old crazy. In the book One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, written by Ken Kesey, the author shows how people can act so differently and have different ways of dealing with their problems. The story is narrated by Chief Bromden who is thought to be deaf and dumb. He tells of a man by the name of R. P. McMurphy, who was a con man, and was convicted of statutory rape. He told the officials that, "she was 18 and very willing if you know what I mean."( ) He was sent to a work farm, where he would spend some time, working off his crime. Since he was so lazy, he faked being insane and was transferred to a mental ward, somewhere near Portland, Oregon. On his arrival he finds some of the other members of the asylum to be almost "normal" and so he tries to make changes to the ward; even though the changes he is trying to make are all at his own expense. As time goes on he gets some of the other inmates to realize that they aren't so crazy and this gets under the skin of the head nurse. Nurse Ratched (the head nurse) and McMurphy have battle upon battle against each other to show who is the stronger of the two. He does many things to get the other guys to leave the ward. First he sets up a fishing trip for some of them, then sets up a basketball team, along with many smaller problems and distractions. Finally Nurse Ratched gives him all he can handle and he attacks her.
...s control through power, authority, and fear. In the end, they believe they have control over the other, but they do not realize that they both have lost control until it is too late. They both pay a harsh penalty for their struggle to gain control over the ward. Nurse Ratched forever loses her precious power status and authority over the institution, while McMurphy loses the friends he tired to help, his personality, and eventually his life. Throughout the novel, these two characters relentlessly fight to control each other. They both realize that control can never be absolute. This idea does not occur to either of them until after they have lost everything they sought to control. This is what makes the element of control such an important theme in One Flew over the Cuckoo?s Nest.
In One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) The character McMurphy as played by Jack Nicholson, McMurphy’s is a criminal who is troubled and keeps being defiant. Instead of pleading guilty, McMurphy pleads insanity and then lands inside a mental hospital. Murphy reasons that being imprisoned within the hospital will be just as bad as being locked up in prison until he starts enjoying being within by messing around with other staff and patients. In the staff, McMurphy continuously irritates Nurse Ratched. You can see how it builds up to a control problem between the inmates and staff. Nurse Ratched is seen as the “institution” and it is McMurphy’s whole goal to rebel against that institution that she makes herself out to be.The other inmates view McMurphy like he is god. He gives the inmates reason to
When norms of society are unfair and seem set in stone, rebellion is bound to occur, ultimately bringing about change in the community. Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest demonstrates the conflict of individuals who have to survive in an environment where they are pressured to cooperate. The hospital's atmosphere suppresses the patients' individuality through authority figures that mold the patients into their visions of perfection. The ward staff's ability to overpower the patients' free will is not questioned until a man named Randal McMurphy is committed to the mental institute. He rebels against what he perceives as a rigid, dehumanizing, and uncompassionate environment. His exposure of the flaws in the hospital's perfunctory rituals permits the other patients to form opinions and consequently their personalities surface. The patient's new behavior clashes with the medical personnel's main goal-to turn them into 'perfect' robots, creating havoc on the ward.
Ken Kesey’s, One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, is a novel containing the theme of emotions being played with in order to confine and change people. One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest is about a mental institution where a Nurse named Miss Ratched has total control over its patients. She uses her knowledge of the patients to strike fear in their minds. Chief Bromden a chronic who suffers from schizophrenia and pretends to be deaf and mute narrates the novel. From his perspective we see the rise and fall of a newly admitted patient, RP McMurphy. McMurphy used his knowledge and courage to bring changes in the ward. During his time period in the ward he sought to end the reign of the dictatorship of Nurse Ratched, also to bring the patients back on their feet. McMurphy issue with the ward and the patients on the ward can be better understood when you look at this novel through a psychoanalytic lens. By applying Daniel Goleman’s theory of emotional intelligence to McMurphy’s views, it is can be seen that his ideas can bring change in the patients and they can use their
In the film One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, the audience is shown the character of Mc Murphy who brought out the conflict of authority, obedience, and disobedience. The film introduces Nurse Ratched as head of the ward and the main authority figure. What this essay will focus on is if Nurse Ratched really ever is negligent? She is simply just doing her job. Would Mcmurphy be considered to be the so-called “evil” character in the film? When he arrives he causes so much chaos between the patients and the nurses. Would the audience agree Mcmurphy is even responsible for a patient's death within the ward?
Nurse Ratched uses her voice throughout the novel to intimidate the patients. She is the antagonist of the novel. The patients obsequiously follow Ratched’s command, until McMurphy comes along. They all fear that she will send them for shock therapy if they don’t obey her. Nurse Ratched is the most daunting persona of the novel, due in large part to the use of her voice.
In the first half of the classic novel One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest, author Ken Kesey uses many themes, symbols, and imagery to illustrate the reality of the lives of a group of mental patients. The story takes place during the 1950s in an Oregon psychiatric hospital and is narrated by a patient on the ward named Chief Bromden. When the novel’s protagonist, Randle P. McMurphy enters the confines of a mental institution from a prison farm, the rules inflicted by the Big Nurse begin to change. Chaos and disruption commence throughout the standard and regular flow of the hospital life, altering the well-established routines due to the threat that McMurphy opposes on the ward. Obviously, it becomes evident that Kesey will convey many viewpoints throughout the course of the story, however, I strongly believe that a recurring theme can be singled out. The main theme behind One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is the idea of freedom and confinement and how it affects human behaviour.
The fundamental theme in Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest involves society's destruction of individuality. People who refuse to conform to the social standards face ridicule and judgment. Kesey develops this theme through his use of mechanical imagery, metaphors, and symbolism. The novel takes place in a mental hospital, the narrator, Chief is a patient in the ward who suffers from vivid hallucinates. When McMurphy, a spirited character arrives at the ward he begins to question the humility of the hospital, his criticisms of the hospital spark a rebellion amongst the other patients. McMurphy teaches the others to think and speak as individuals and to be themselves despite others judgements. As Nurse Ratched sees the usually powerless patients find power in numbers she decides their leader, McMurphy must be eliminated if she wants to maintain control. She eventually has McMurphy lobotomized leaving him in a vegetable state. In the end Chief runs away from the hospital deciding to no longer live his life under the oppressive rule of doctors and nurses. After being inspired by McMurphy’s free thinking ways Chief decides that living a life dictated by society is not a quality life.
The novel, which takes place in an Oregon psychiatric hospital, centers around the conflict between manipulative Nurse Ratched and her patients. Randle McMurphy, a transfer from Pendleton Work Farm, becomes a champion for the men’s cause as he sets out to overthrow the dictator-like nurse. Initially, the reader may doubt the economic implications of the novel. Yet, if one looks closer at the numerous textual references to power, production, and profit, he or she will begin to interpret Cuckoo’s Nest in a
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey is as social commentary against mental institutions. Randle P. McMurphy acts as an agent against institutionalization throughout the novel. The novel tracks the events shared by Chief Bromden, a tall Native American man who pretends to be deaf and mute, Randle P. McMurphy and the patients within a psychiatric ward. Chief Bromden is deemed schizophrenic and is institutionalized for twenty years prior to McMurphy’s arrival. McMurphy instills hope and confidence into the patients which then allows the patients to truly re-evaluate their lives. Before McMurphy arrived, Bromden hides within a metaphorical fog along with the remaining patients. The fog provides the patients comfort and a place to hide