Hottoceame The Age of Commercialism

Chatverock Takes itself way too seriously

CommentsXp Best movie ever!

Curt Watching it is like watching the spectacle of a class clown at their best: you laugh at their jokes, instigate their defiance, and "ooooh" when they get in trouble.

antoniocasaca123 Well-intentioned film, merit in the way it shows us what psychiatric institutions were like at the time and the fantastic performance of Olivia De Havilland, in the role of Virginia. However, the film fails in how it "solves" the problem of Virginia's disease. After all, even excessive, sequences of Virginia's forgetfulness and confusion, her "cure" is resolved abruptly, very "in haste," and unconvincing. It was worth the director little ability to give credibility to Virginia's improvement through Dr. Kik's psychoanalysis. It was all very fast, the previous development of the film, sometimes even too slow, did not leave this anticipation so fast and implausible based on 1 or 2 flashbacks from when Virginia was a child. Still, a movie that deserves to be seen by the virudes I mentioned above.

Hitchcoc I think one of the most terrifying things that could happen to a person is to be incarcerated in an institution where you have been judged, but you don't have the wherewithal to defend yourself. Olivia De Havilland's character is institutionalized, through her husband's actions, and doesn't know why. As she wades through her memories, she begins to come around. Unfortunately, it takes someone to believe in you to get listened to. Let's face it, the grunt workers here are full of prejudices and suspicions. These are, after all, crazy people. Things get really complicated when De Havilland's character begins to get close to a handsome doctor. She starts to come into her own a bit, loved by her fellow patients, but a woman who is jealous sets things up to get her put into "the snake pit." This is the place where the hopeless go. It sounds a good deal like Dante's circles of hell.

screenman Before Jack Nicholson and 'The Cuckoo's Nest', there was Olivia De Haviland in 'The Snake Pit'.Released in 1948, this was a daring effort to disclose the bleak and terrifying world of mental illness and the inadequate institutions within which sufferers were interned. As in 'Cuckoo's Nest', there was even a malignant, tyrannical nurse preying upon the inmates' indispositions; here competently played by Helen Craig.Olivia De Haviland is a tour-de-force as someone trapped in a system that is almost exclusively self-accountable and is therefore a law unto itself. Nobody really wants to know. Mental illness is either too embarrassing or too terrifying to address. Shut 'em all away. Doctor knows best. What's more alarming is the fact that this movie is based upon a true story. Criminal Institutions still receive better funding.Halfway through the 20th century things had barely advanced beyond the Victorian times. Sadly; things haven't improved much further since. A recent visit (making a delivery) to a facility in St Pancras Hospital in London was scarcely less terrifying than the events portrayed in this work.This is a must-see movie, and not just for entertainment. People need to be aware of what may await their relatives or themselves if the medical profession decides that your condition is chronic.

sol1218 ***SPOILERS*** The film "The Snake Pit" is based on the true life story, and book, of Mary Jane Ward who herself was a patient in an upstate New York State mental hospital for some 8 1/2 months which is why it's so accurate in depicting the events that happened there to her.Virginia Stuart, Olivia deHavilland, is a young writer who's looking to author her first novel when she meets young and handsome Robert Cunningham, Mark Stevens, who works for a publishing house in New York City. At first things are going really good for the young couple and their soon married until one day when Virigina spies the date May 12 on a local newspaper at her and Robert's apartment and completely loses it! Becoming paranoid and uncontrollable over the mysterious date-May 12-Robert feels that she's having some kind of mental breakdown and tries to get her, without Virginia going along with it, psychiatric help. It's then that all the demons from Virginia's dark past comes to the surface in her not being able to face them! And it's non other then her husband Robert who unknowingly set them off!Shocking and eye opening even now as it was then back, in 1948, drama about mental illness and how it can not only destroy those who suffer from it but also their, in this case husband, loved ones and family members along with them. Committed to the Juniper Hill Mental Hospital Virginia is put through "the works", like anti-psychotic drugs and shock treatment, not only in trying to identify the reasons for her deteriorating mental state but to cure her from them as well. It's when the "Top Kick" at the hospital Dr. Mark Kik, Leo Genn, put the by now amnesic suffering Virginia under his wings that she finally showed signs of improvement. But only after going through the living hell of overcoming her slew of mental illnesses cold turkey style on her own by facing what are the reasons that causing them!***SPOILERS*** It turns out that besides suffering from a severe case of schizophrenia Virginia's attempt in having relationship with men like her husband Robert is actually a non-starter! This all goes back to Virginia's childhood as well as her first attempt to get married to hometown boyfriend Gordon, Leif Erickson. It was Gordon who got himself killed in a traffic accident back when, startled by what she told him, Virginia changed her mind in marrying him just before the two were to tie the knot! This caused Gordon to lose control of his automobile, as he made a U-turn in a blinding rain storm, and smash into a tractor trailer and end up killing himself with Virginia not only surviving, in fact walking away, from the wreckage but developing deep guilt feeling In her then fiancée's sudden death! The date of Gordon's tragic accident was May 12! The same date that Virginia want's so desperately blot out of her mind!With Dr. Kik's help and her own recognition of her problems Virginia does in fact not only overcome her own mental illness but she also becomes a much better and caring person for those lonely and helpless individuals like herself because of it. In what is by by far the best thing to come out in Virginia's recovery she makes friends with her fellow mental patient the scared and speechless, in not wanting to communicate with the outside world, Hester, Betsy Blair. It was Virginia who went out of her way, despite her own mental problems, in trying to help Hester that in the end borough her out of her self imposed exile from the human race. And it was that more then anything else that gave Virginia the reason to overcome her own mental illness by helping Hester overcome hers!