Tis the season for big-screen literary adaptations. Almost every major film of this Oscar-lusting time has been adapted from some book or story. Green Mile? Yep. Snow Falling on Cedars? Of course. Angela's Ashes, The Hurricane, and Talented Mr. Ripley? Yes, yes, and you betcha. And the mouse that roared this holiday season is very loosely stolen from E.B. White's famous tale. Even Oliver Stone's Any Given Sunday took its title, though little else, from a book. And now comes Girl, Interrupted, based on the best-selling (probably a redundant phrase in this sort of thing) memoirs of Susanna Kaysen.

Kaysen was 17 years old when a psychiatrist, with her parents' blessing, checked her into Claymoore, a mental hospital for the upper crust. She was diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder, "manifested by uncertainty about self-image, long-term goals, types of friends or lovers to have, and which values to adopt." Of course, thirty years later, those traits would seem perfectly normal for a maturing adolescent; but this was 1967, when young women from rich, New England families were expected to go to Wellesley or Smith, and know exactly what they were going to do afterwards--marry in their class and carry on the family's traditions. For Kaysen, the only person from her graduating class not going on to college, to be abnormal meant some sort of mental illness.

Actually, the movie is more complicated than that. Kaysen is not just an alienated teenager but one who attempted suicide and doesn't quite grasp reality (she thinks the bones in her hand disappear and reappear). Those things might not necessarily require being committed to a hospital, but in some situations they might. The film, to its credit, doesn't gloss over the complexities.

Furthermore, the film refuses to simplify life inside the institution. In contrast to most "crazy" films, most noticeably One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, the hospital workers are not cold-hearted sadists. While Dr. Melvin (Jeffrey Tambor, Larry Sanders Show) is misguided as a psychiatrist, he's doing the best he can. And the nurses, embodied in Whoopi Goldberg's standard persona, are well-meaning though sometimes frustrated. The patients aren't exactly angels, either. While it's never clear why most of them have been (or should've been) institutionalized, they all have clear problems. In fact, the only stereotypical characters in the movie are the parents, and fortunately they're not on screen much.

Girl, Interrupted is, at its core, not a typical good-crazy vs. bad-doctor. So what is it? Strangely enough, it's a female buddy picture, as Susanna (Winona Ryder, Age of Innocence) and Lisa (Angelina Jolie, Bone Collector) bond in the confines of their rooms and hallways. Lisa, with her devil-may-care attitude and forceful personality, is the dominant figure among the clients. For reasons that aren't exactly clear, she takes a liking to Susanna, and the two form a bond that draws in the other women patients and even a guard or two. There's a great scene early in the film when several of the patients sneak down into the basement where a small bowling alley's been set up. Their glee not so much at bowling but in doing something they shouldn't is wonderful to watch.

The acting in Girl, Interrupted is decent but nothing special. While director and screenwriter James Mangold (Copland, Heavy) was able to draw out an amazing performance from Sylvester Stallone in Copland, here Ryder and Jolie give their typical portrayals--Ryder with her vulnerable, wide-eyed waifishness and Jolie with her feral, wild-girl physicality. 

During the movie, I was struck by how these roles were defined by the actors' physical make-up. It would've been impossible for the tiny Ryder to play the domineering Lisa, and vice-versa for Jolie. It should be noted, though, that Vanessa Redgrave has a very nice cameo as the head of the institution.

The direction and music (taken from popular songs of the time) is also solid, if not spectacular. In fact, the whole movie has a well-made exterior but with little real meaning. It's never clear if Kaysen should've been committed or whether the experience helped or hurt her in any way. And the friendships she makes inside are interesting, but you don't feel bad once she leaves. In fact, the only emotion I felt as Susanna takes a cab back home was one of satisfaction that I too could go home. 

J. Robert Parks