Girl, Interrupted



"Dr. Crumble: "Susanna, four days ago you chased a bottle of aspirin with a bottle of vodka." Susanna: "I had a headache.""

American film released in 1999, starring Winona Ryder, Angelina Jolie, Whoopi Goldberg and Brittany Murphy. Based on writer Susanna Kaysen's account of her stay in a mental institution in the late 1960's.

Shortly after her high school graduation and a subsequent suicide attempt (probably), upper middle class Susanna (Ryder) is admitted to Claymoore Psychiatric Hospital, where she meets and in some cases befriends other young, female patients, most notably Lisa (Jolie), the charismatic ring leader. The group rebels against the oppression of institutionalized life, going bowling in the basement at night and breaking into the doctor's office to read their case files. Susanna is diagnosed with borderline personality disorder, Lisa is a sociopath, Georgina a compulsive liar and the saccharine Polly is a disturbed burn victim. Other patients count an anorexic called Janet, a Butch Lesbian called Cynthia - homosexuality still being regarded as a mental disorder at the time - and the hostile Daisy, who's dealing with an eating disturbance of her very own and is somewhat at odds with Lisa.

After some rule breaking and conflicts with the staff that leads to Lisa being taken away for electroshock treatment, she and Susanna escape one night. It ends up being a rather short trip during which Susanna becomes disenchanted with Lisa and voluntarily returns to Claymoore. Lisa is later returned too, less voluntarily and in a pretty bad state. Susanna, in the meantime, has recovered and is preparing to leave the institution, which leads to a final showdown between her and Lisa.

Jolie won quite a few awards for her supporting role, among them a Golden Globe and an Oscar.

"Dr. Potts: You've been feeling bad in general. You've been feeling depressed? Susanna: Well, I haven't exactly been a ball of joy, Melvin."
 * Abusive Parents:
 * Bad Liar: Georgina is a compulsive liar, so this trope is a given.
 * Based on a True Story: The film is based on the memoirs of Susanna Kaysen. It's not the most faithful adaptation in the world, but it's still recognizable.
 * Bittersweet Ending
 * Breaking Speech: Lisa's specialty. One of the nurses had to be taken away in a straightjacket due to her doing this, At the end, Susanna delivers her one.
 * Broken Bird: Every patient, since they're young and mentally ill, with many having a Freudian Excuse.
 * Broken Record: "Don't they know it's the end of the world..."
 * Broken Tears: Susanna after
 * Brutal Honesty: Lisa doesn't sugarcoat anything.
 * Butch Lesbian: Cynthia. Values Dissonance applies here, since at the time homosexuality was considered a mental disease.
 * Cluster F-Bomb
 * Crashing Dreams: The "checks" that interrupt Susanna's flashback daydreams early in the film.
 * Cute Kitten: Ruby, Susanna's cat.
 * The Cutie: Polly is the closest person to be this, despite her facial scars.
 * Deadpan Snarker: Susanna, on occasion.

"Dr. Wick: Is there something about sex which lifts your feelings of despair? Susanna: Have you ever had sex?"
 * Double Standard: Not the film, but the morality of the time. Susanna's promiscuity is considered pathological and she asks if the reaction would have been the same, had she been male.
 * Draft Dodging:
 * Driven to Suicide: Susanna attempting it (despite her denying claims) is what got her committed to the institution.
 * Erotic Eating: The "nuts" scene in the ice cream parlor.
 * Fingore: Susanna accidentally slams her fingers in a heavy sliding door towards the end of the film.
 * Hollywood New England: Claymoore is in suburban Boston.
 * Hollywood Tone Deaf: Averted. Susanna and Lisa's rendition of "Downtown" is realistically off-key, and is one of the film's more heartwarming moments.
 * How We Got Here
 * Inferiority Superiority Complex: Daisy acts like a haughty Spoiled Brat to deal with her pill addiction, self-harm and OCD Especially evident with her confrontation with Lisa: she tries to act all mighty and rubs the fact she got free from the asylum in her face to defend herself, only for Lisa to break her pretense so horribly
 * Lisa herself, as if to prove she and Daisy are Not So Different. She enjoys messing with everyone in the asylum, but as Susanna spells it out to her, this is the only way she copes with the fact she's a messed-up shell of a person. This realization sends her into a heartbreaking Villainous Breakdown.
 * Jerkass: To call Lisa this is an Understatement, though she does have Pet the Dog moments.
 * Kick the Dog: Lisa's speech to Daisy,.
 * Lack of Empathy: Lisa. To best illustrate, her reaction to  is to scoff "Aw, what an idiot" and loot its pockets.
 * Lawyer-Friendly Cameo: Claymoore Hospital for McLean Hospital. Does not apply in the book (and seeing as it's a memoir, it doesn't have to).
 * Never Trust a Trailer: There is great exchange in the trailer that never made it into the finished film:

"Daisy: My father loves me. Lisa: I bet."
 * Parental Incest:
 * The Pollyanna: Polly, fittingly enough.
 * Race Lift: Valerie is white in the book. In the movie, she is played by Whoopi Goldberg.
 * "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Lisa to Daisy, and later Susanna to Lisa.
 * Self-Harm: Susanna in the novel, and Daisy in the film.
 * Shut UP, Hannibal: After being screwed over by Lisa one time too many, Susanna delivers an effective one to her, which sends her into a Villainous Breakdown.
 * The Shrink: Obviously. Several varieties.
 * The Sociopath: Lisa is diagnosed as such.
 * Title Drop: In Susanna's opening narrative.
 * Tragic Villain: Lisa.
 * Villainous Breakdown: Lisa at the end.
 * Vomit Discretion Shot: Happens during a flashback showing Susanna having her stomach pumped.
 * Wham! Line: This exchange:

"Lisa: Everybody knows that What they don't know... is that you like it."
 * And she doesn't stop there:

"Lisa: You know, there's too many buttons in the world. There's too many buttons and they're just... they're just begging to be pressed, and it makes me wonder, it really makes me fucking wonder, why doesn't anyone ever press mine? Why am I so neglected? Why doesn't anyone reach in and rip out the truth and tell me that I'm a fucking whore, or that my parents wish I were dead? Susanna: BECAUSE YOU'RE DEAD ALREADY, LISA!"
 * Susanna delivers one to Lisa when she demands an explanation for why no one presses her buttons, sending Lisa into a Villainous Breakdown: