Winona Ryder as Susanna

Luckily, life isn't a total psychiatric snake pit for Winona as the uncertain and confused Susanna, or Angelina as the sociopathically free-spirited Lisa, or the other pathological liars, laxative-gobbling anorexics and interrupted girls of their ward. In fact, the hospital resembles a college dorm more than a madhouse. They chain smoke cigarettes; watch war protests, lottery drafts and the Wizard of Oz on television; paint their nails and trade every kind, color and shape of pill they can smuggle past their not-so-observant nurses. Throw in a few unopened political science books and some Haagen Dazs cartons and this could have been any campus across America for the past thirty years. Furthermore, the ladies who loon are so unsupervised after lights out that they roam the maze of tunnels underneath the campus and stage impromptu bowling parties and sing-alongs. It's no wonder that Winona turns down a chance to escape to Canada with an old boyfriend who's escaping the draft. She wants to leave, she says, but not with him. And who can blame her; it's much warmer and fuzzier back upstairs with her occasionally suicidal sorority sisters than in the decidedly more insane real world outside.

Angelina Jolie as Lisa

All this changes, however, after an overnight AWOL misadventure with Lisa ends in the death of a recently released roommate who was supposedly "cured." Susanna realizes that maybe these girls are insane after all and that comfy as it is, she might not really belong there. Having come face to face with true mortality, Susanna chooses to stop being so ambivalent about her current address and focuses on convincing her doctors that she is no longer a threat to herself and can be trusted once again to observe recommended dosages and the proper use of sharp objects. She then begins to keep a journal of pithy observations and big-eyed illustrations of herself and her friends to demonstrate her ever-strengthening grip on the reigns of reality. All is almost lost, however, when vixen/villain Lisa and the other girls stage a reading of Susanna's writings on the climactic last night before Susanna's release. Needless to say, the girls who aren't getting out are none too pleased with the portraits that their now "normal" friend has painted of them. Though the ensuing hysteria and melodrama get a bit heavy handed and wrap up way too quickly, the plot's never boring or entirely predictable and, best of all, there's nary a Pokeman in sight.

Girl, Interrupted is an ambitious and entertaining picture that redeems director James Mangold from his last ambitious, yet not-so-worthwhile effort, Cop Land. Winona Ryder, whose performance is both passionate and poignant, has been involved in bringing Susanna Kaysen's story to the screen for over six years and is credited as one of the movie's executive producers. Production notes reveal that Ryder could relate somewhat personally to Kaysen's memoirs, Winona having spent some voluntary time "resting" to cope with anxiety attacks when she was 20. "Psychological illness can strike anyone, anywhere," Ryder warns. "That's one of the greatest elements of Susanna's story."

Also putting fine work into Girl Interrupted is Oscar-winner Whoopi Goldberg as the funky, but firm Nurse Valerie who urges Susanna not to "drop anchor here." Nurse Valerie is a Devil's Food cupcake compared to One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest’s nefarious Nurse Ratched. Another Oscar winner, Vanessa Redgrave, is also on hand to grace the proceedings with her kindly gaze as the hospital's head shrink, Dr. Wick. Unfortunately, all I could think when watching Ms. Redgrave was how much she looked like a really old David Bowie.

Set at McLean Psychiatric in New England, Girl, Interrupted was actually filmed on the grounds of Harrisburg State Hospital, a currently functioning mental health facility, formerly known as Pennsylvania State Lunatic Hospital in less politically correct times. Coincidentally, McLean Psychiatric is also where Sylvia Plath, author of another classic autobiography of insanity and suicide, The Bell Jar, had been a patient.

Despite several plot holes large enough to drive an ambulance through, Girl, Interrupted is an affecting and effective work with moods that swing with the captivating power of a hypnotist's pendulum. Intelligent, ironic and inspired, you'd have to be crazy to miss it. Sorry, I couldn't resist that one.

December 1999