Cocaine Cowboys

Primarily documents the crimes, the criminals, and their personalities with live interviews of some key players in the Miami cocaine trade during the 1970's and 1980's. Numerous scenes depicting drugs and using flash briefly across the screen.

Bales of marijuana (0:06, 0:10)

Packages of cocaine (0:07, 0:09, 0:13, 0:14, 0:26, 0:30, 1:33)

Powder cocaine (0:08, 0:27, 0:29, 0:32)

Cocaine harvest and production (0:17)

Lines of cocaine on mirrors, snorting (0:29, 0:32)

Smoking freebase cocaine (0:32)

Antisocial Personality Disorder | cocaine

The Best Years of Our Lives

#bestyearsofourlives

Returning bombardier Fred has a nightmare about a plane crash during combat. (0:51) Do you see any other signs or symptoms of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder?

Fred tries to recall what happened the night before when he was drinking. Was this an alcoholic blackout? (0:58)

Store manager Mr. Thorpe uses a nasal inhaler repeatedly while talking to Fred about jobs. If he were using it solely for decongestant effect, would he have done so in front of a prospective employee? Would he have used it so frequently? Might this have been a Benzedrine inhaler? (1:15)

Fred's wife Marie asks him about what she heard him say during his nightmares. (1:32)

Fred's love interest Peggy tells her parents that she wants to meet Fred's wife because she thinks it will have a "healthy effect" with respect to her feelings for Fred. (1:50) This movement on her part should close the distance in her relationship to Marie. Is she instinctively balancing a relationship triangle to reduce dysfunction in their relationships?

(alcoholic) blackout | amphetamine | Posttraumatic Stress Disorder | triangulation

The Last Picture Show

Spoiler alert!

Soon after the film opens (0:01) we see Billy sweeping the street. Throughout the film he does not talk. He seems to have limited range of interest, but does socialize with peers, especially protagonist Sonny who affectionately turns Billy's hat around at every opportunity. What might have caused his mutism? Is he intellectually impaired?

Waitress Genevieve tells Sonny, "Your dad's taking too many pills." (0:14) We see him only once, barely smiling as he talks to Sonny briefly at a dance. (0:32)

Sonny tells the other guys, defending his friend Billy, "He's no idiot. He just don't talk." (0:42)

Pool hall owner Sam has died. His old flame Lois grieves at the burial.(1:07)

While sweeping the street a truck has struck and killed Billy. A bystander refers to him as a "simple minded kid." Sonny carries his body away. (1:53)

Sonny talks to Lois about their loss of Sam. (1:41)

Bereavement | Mental Retardation | mutism

Young Frankenstein

(Young) Dr. Frankenstein lectures on brain anatomy. (0:05)

Dr. Frankenstein asks, "Is the sedative ready?" (0:53)

Frankenstein's assistant Inga injects the monster first in the gluteal area (0:56) and again later in the back (1:12)

Franskenstein observes, "If I could find a way to equalize the imbalance in his cerebrospinal fluid he'd be as right as rain." (1:24) Could this be an early reference to what we now call "chemical imbalance?"

chemical imbalance | sedative

Easy Rider

A buyer tests a spoonful of cocaine. (0:03)

Smoking joints: biker Billy (1:29); biker Wyatt (0:10, 0:23); Billy and Wyatt (0:31, 0:39)

Wyatt gives attorney George a joint, saying "This is grass." George replies, "You mean marijuana." George smokes it. (0:55)

Billy and Wyatt take prostitutes Mary and Karen to a cemetary in New Orleans where they share an unidentified drug, most likely LSD. The resulting intoxication leads to emotional lability. (1:23)

cannabis | cocaine | Hallucinogen Intoxication | joint | LSD

Good Will Hunting

#goodwillhunting

Spoiler alert!

According to the old light bulb joke it only takes one psychiatrist to change a light bulb, but the light bulb has to want to change.

Will Hunting does not want to change.

The eight psychotherapy sessions depicted in this film address -- or raise -- some of the most interesting questions about current practice of psychotherapy and its ethics. Despite all the broken rules both the patient and the psychotherapist seem to benefit greatly from this short course of this -- can you really call it treatment? How can we explain its success, much of which seems to derive from the fact that Sean and Will share some early experiences, which simultaneously seems implausible and inevitable?

Although some sort of emotional factor seems to play a role in Wills unwillingness to exercise his full potential, we see little evidence that he suffers from a mental illness. What diagnosis might you enter in his record if you were treating him? On the other hand we might easily diagnose Sean with Bereavement. (Compare to his role as a bereaved husband in The Fisher King.)

When math professor Gerald comes to believe that janitor Will may never share his own mathematical talents with the world without his intervention, he works out a deal with the courts and asks a series of three psychotherapists to treat Will, apparently for free. Consider whether these treatments might have proceeded differently had Will (or an insurer) been paying. Would a managed care organization reimburse for this treatment? How do you think Sean would handle a case reviewer on the phone?

What brand of psychotherapy does Sean use? We see no evidence of CBT. Sean seems to break almost every conceivable rule of psychoanalytic treatment. The treatment does not last nearly long enough. (Especially for psychoanalyst Glen Gabbard who, in his book Psychiatry and the Cinema, dismisses the treatment as "pure Hollywood fiction.") Even the silent session intervention seems more directed than your routine analytic silence.

Ordinarily considered essential to psychotherapy as a profession is the expectation that the psychotherapist says or does,  not what he feels like saying or doing, but rather what he believes will be most therapeutic to the patient. Sean appears heedless of this principle through most of the treatment, but especially  when he grabs Will by the neck and slams him against a bookshelf. Will has pushed his button, and Sean fails to control his reaction. (He couldn't possibly have acted after a split second judgment that that was exactly what Will needed. Or could he?) Although he has unarguably suffered a crushing loss in the death of his wife from cancer, such bereavement cannot be considered rare or extraordinary among psychotherapists. Compare Sean's handling of his loss to that of Moretti's psychoanalyst in The Son's Room. Sean does rapidly relinquish his anger at Will, seemingly leaving him even better able to help his patient.

Professional boundaries seem nonexistent in this treatment. Will's treatments, even with Sean, seem almost public. Sean in particular discusses Will's case openly with Gerald. What happened to confidentiality? Does a relationship triangle come into play here?

Can we take any lessons from this treatment into our own practices? One cannot expect to easily match backgrounds of patient and psychotherapist. I have rarely encountered situations in which I though slamming a patient against a wall or threatening to kill them would be therapeutic. I have not even shared with a patient how much weight I can bench press.

The film:

Undiscovered genius Will, at home, speed reads the book, "Help Your Self," written by Henry, the psychotherapist he visits in the next scene. Will appears to toy with Henry, ultimately appearing to see through him. Will accuses Henry of having a sexual interest in him. Leaving the office, Henry tells Gerald, blaming Will for the failure, "I can't do this pro bono work anymore. It's just not worth it... I haven't got time... to talk to that raving loony in there, an absolute lunatic he is." (0:29)

Will fakes a trance convincing hypnotherapist Rich that he has hypnotized him, but after toying with this one, too, Will, now pretending to hypnotize Gerald with a keychain, tells him, "Look into my eyes... I don't need therapy." (0:31)

Psychotherapist Sean lectures bored, inattentive community college students. On the blackboard behind him he has written the word "stages" and names like Engel, Bowlby, Kubler-Ross, Parkes, Fernald, Stein, and Susser. Ending the lecture he tells the students that on Monday, "We'll talk about Freud, why he did enough cocaine to kill a small horse." (0:33)

Sean, unlike the other psychotherapists, talks about his own pain and the time "before Nancy [his wife] died." (0:35)

Sean asks Will how many "shrinks" he saw before him. Sean mentions linguist Noam Chomsky (0:37)

Attempting to play with Sean as he did with the other psychotherapist, will speculates about Sean's demons, referring to him as a psychologist, but he crosses the line when he tells Sean, "You married the wrong woman." Sean grabs him by the neck and pushes him up against a book shelf. Sean threatens, "I will end you..." if he disrespects his wife again. (We see a copy of "I'm OK You're OK" on the bookshelf behind Will. Maybe his techniques derive from Transactional Analysis. Nah.) (0:41)

In the first of several scenes in which it appears that Sean may be getting as much out of the psychotherapy as is his patient, Sean's expression as Will leaves the office betrays that Will has touched something in him emotionally. (0:42)

Sean conducts psychotherapy session number two on a park bench. (0:46) He tells Will how he processed what will said in the last session. He goes on to confront him about Will's lack of experience in life. Is Sean reassuring himself that he need not take anything will said to seriously? (0:47)

Session number three: silence. Later, Sean explains to Gerald, "I can't talk first." (0:53)

Session number four: as Sean nods off Will starts talking. Sean tells will about his wife again: "She's been dead two years." He tells Will our imperfections are "the good stuff" and, "You're not perfect, sport." Sean then denigrates his own wisdom and knowledge, putting himself in a one down position. Will tells Sean he talks more than any "shrink I've seen in my life." Will shifts the focus back to Sean and how he has coped with his loss, but when he confronts Sean, Sean tells him the session is over. (0:54)

Will tries to push Skyler away, but she does not let him. (1:26)

Session number five: Sean ends the session early, confronting Will that he is not talking about what matters. Will shifts the focus back to Sean, but this time, although Sean appears to sense the truth in what Will has told him, he refuses to allow him to derail the session and sends him packing. (1:34)

Session number six: Sean fails to show up. (1:40)

Sean discusses Will's treatment with Gerald, telling him Will "pushes people away." (1:44) Will overhears the argument as he enters the office for session number seven. Sean tells Will that Sean's own father was an alcoholic and how he would provoke him to violence. Each talks about physical abuse by their fathers. Sean tells Will, "It's not your fault." Will responds matter-of-factly, "I know." Sean keeps repeating, "It's not your fault," until Will says, "Don't f*ck with me," gets it, cries, and hugs Sean. (1:46)

Session number eight: apparently ending the treatment, Sean agrees with Will, "That's it. You're done. You're a free man." (1:52) Sean and Will thank each other and hug each other. Will says "Hey, does this violate the patient doctor relationship?" Sean responds, "Nah, only if you grab my ass." (1:54)

Sean reads a note Will has left him. (2:02)

Does Will have anything in common with Vitus?

Bereavement | boundaries | hypnotism | psychologist | psychotherapist | psychotherapy

Nobody Knows

Japan's answer to Slumdog Millionaire, but without the happy ending? Single mother Keiko abandons her four young children in a Tokyo apartment, leaving 13 year old son Akira in charge.

Bereavement

Amarcord

Titta's mother Maranda, arguing with his father Aurelio about Titta's behavior, says, "But I'll kill myself first." Aurelio replies, "You'll see! I'll kill myself first!" He then appears to attempt suicide by tearing his own jaws apart. (0:29)

The rest of the family stops to pick up "mad uncle" Teo from a psychiatric hospital  for an outing. He shows off stones he keeps in his pockets, and he neglects to open his pants when he urinates, thus wetting his pants. (1:07) How might you diagnose him?

Teo climbs to the top of the tree and refuses to come down, shouting, "I want a woman." (1:14)

Staff from the psychiatric hospital dressed in white arrive to get Teo down. "Some days he's normal. Some days he's not. Just like the rest of us." (1:21)

Titta learns that Maranda has died. (1:53) A funeral is held.

Bereavement | psychiatric hospital | suicide

Sholay

Soorma offers bandits Veeru and Jai some betel leaves. (0:25)

Police officer Thakur discovers that villain Gabbar has murdered most of his family. (1:35)

Veeru, intoxicated and distraught, threatens to jump to his death from a water tower because he has been refused marriage to chatterbox carriage driver Basanti. (2:06)

Thakur's niece Radha appears to have been mute since the murder of her family. "It's almost as if she's forgotten to speak." (2:22)

Bereavement | mutism | suicide

Georgia Rule

We learn that veterinarian Simon lost his wife and son in a motor vehicle accident. (0:26)

Teen Rachel tells Simon, "I was 12 years old when my stepfather first started having sex with me." (0:31)

Rachel tells her mother, Lilly, of sexual abuse by her stepfather, Arnold. (0:52)

Lilly tells Simon, "I need Antabuse." (1:13)

Lilly appears to drink alcoholicly through much of the film and often appears intoxicated. There is almost constant conflict between her and her mother Georgia. Georgia tells Lilly that her own parents never told her they loved her. Georgia, with her rules for almost everything, seems rigid, at least on the surface.

alcoholism | Bereavement | disulfiram | multigenerational transmission | Sexual Abuse of a Child

Totally Baked (Unrated)

This mockumentary challenges with humour, including stand up comedians, most of the myths of marijuana as dangerous and a few of the myths of the drug as innoucuos. Brief and more extended scenes depicting smoking joints, various pipes, and the substance itself too numerous to catalog, occur throughout the film.

A medical marijuana advocate slips a marijuana opponent some ipecac to make him nauseated, then offers him "legal options for nausea... Compazine, Ativan, decadron... Zofran or ... " contrasting them with cannabis as safer and cheaper. (0:37)

A marijuana user talks about attending Marijuana Anonymous meeting where an attendee admitted he "knew I hit bottom when I drank my bong juice" (0:39)

Cannabis intoxication (0:44, 0:57)

Marijuana baked into brownies. (0:47)

Comparison of amounts needed to accomplish lethal overdose of cocaine, heroin, and marijuana. (0:51)

cannabis | Cannabis Intoxication | joint | overdose

Toy Story 3

A toy says about the Sunnyside day care center, "Returning now would be suicide." (0:52)

suicide

1900

Young "Padrone" Alfredo's grandfather Alfredo cannot recognize family members, is told "You ask me the same thing every evening." Another family member comments that he "gets worse every day" apparently demonstrating a progressive dementia. (0:38)

The elder Alfredo hangs himself. (0:58)

A young woman appears to suffer a grand mal seizure related to indigestion of alcohol. (2:07)

Funeral procession. (2:35)

Alfredo's uncle Ottavio shares cocaine with Alfredo and their friend Ada in a hotel room. He uses a knife to form lines of coke on a table. (2:46)

Alfredo discovers that his father has died. (2:54)

Bereavement | cocaine | dementia | suicide

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs

Inventor Flint says, "It had been almost 10 years since mom died." (0:09)

Flint, in a moment of despair, says, referring to himself, "This is junk." (0:56)

Believing Flint has been killed, weather person Sam and Flint's father Tim grieve. (1:17)

Bereavement | self-esteem

Metallica: Some Kind of Monster

Although this documentary reveals the history, creative process, and relationship challenges of a popular heavy metal band, we also see coaching (Or is it psychotherapy?) by a professional present during most of the filming. Many of the interventions resemble those used in couples, group or family psychotherapy. Are the interventions more skillfully introduced than by the average psychotherapist? It does seem clear that he is not treating anyone's mental disorder.

Introduction of "therapist" or performance enhancement coach Phil Towle. (0:04) Which is he?

The first of numerous "sessions" managed or attended by Mr. Towle. (0:11)

MTV announces that Metallica lead singer James Hetfield has entered rehabilitation for alcohol and drug problems. (0:32)

James talks about sober life. (1:04)

James talks about the loss of his mother at age 16. (1:14)

Discussion of the death of former Metallica bass guitar player Cliff in a bus accident. (1:24)

The band discusses whether to begin reducing Mr. Towle's involvement (1:27)

James and drummer Lars appear to resolve some of their conflict. (1:39) Did Mr. Towle's interventions help?

Revelation that the band pays Mr. Towle $40,000 per month for his services. (1:46) Is he worth it?

Mr. Towle makes a case for continuing his role with the band, but the band appears intent upon terminating his services. (1:59)

James gives Mr. Towle credit for helping the band. (2:10) Do you agree?

As a psychotherapist would you like to have this job? I might formulate the problem as a relationship triangle with James and Lars in an intense, close and conflicted relationship, while guitar player Kirk remains distant. The fact that Kirk mostly avoids siding with either of his band mates may help, but if you were the psychotherapist, might you move him closer to each of them?

psychotherapist | psychotherapy | triangulation

What's Eating Gilbert Grape

Spoiler alert!

Gilbert's 17-year-old younger brother Arnie appears at the beginning of the film. Although he is never diagnosed his behavior suggests mental retardation. Are there other possibilities? (0:00)

Gilbert says about his brother, "Doctors say he could go anytime." But what could kill him? (0:03)

We discover Gilberts mother Bonnie is morbidly obese. (0:04)

Among other psychopathology Arnie copies the words of others (echolalia, echophilia) and repeats the words multiple times (palilalia, perseveration, verbigeration): He repeats the word "disappear," mimicking Bonnie's talk. (0:15) He displays rocking movements. (0:25) After Gilbert says, "Dad's dead." Arnie repeats the words and escalates to loss of control. (0:26) Arnie repeats, "We're not going anywhere." (0:36) While bathing Arnie, Gilbert says, "You're such a big boy." Arnie repeats "big boy" over and over. (0:43)

Arnie displays inappropriate affect: laughing with Gilbert. (0:19); laughing after Mr. Carver is found. (0:56)

Burial of Kenneth Carver. While at the cemetery Arnie plays next to the tombstone of his father, Albert. (1:10)

Betty Carver accurately observes Gilbert's role of "taking care of everybody else, forgetting all about you." Might we label him codependent? (1:13)

After striking Arnie in a fit of rage Gilbert tries to leave but fails. (1:23)

Arnie cannot arouse Bonnie. (1:44)

All the children gather in a room with Bonnie to grieve the loss of their mother. (1:46)

Do you  see similarities between Arnie and Charlie in The Black Balloon?

Bereavement | echolalia | echophilia | inappropriate affect | Mental Retardation | obesity | palilalia | perseveration | verbigeration

Valmont

Spoiler alert!

To trump conniving Merteuil, the disreputable Valmont, who loves her, gets drunk to make it easier for young Danceny to kill him in a duel (off camera). (2:03) Wake and viewing of the body follow.

Bereavement | suicide

Beat the Devil

Gwendolen makes up a story, ostensibly to protect her husband Harry: "In point of fact my husband has an illness of the mind. The medical word for it is "paranoia." On occasion he displays homicidal tendencies. Psychiatrists say it's because he believes people are plotting against him... We tried everything to cure him." (1:06)

Inquisitor Ahmed smokes an unidentified substance with a hookah. (1:14)

hookah | paranoia

Mr. Untouchable

This documentary chronicles the rise and fall of 1970s Harlem, New York heroin kingpin Leroy "Nicky" Barnes, a.k.a. Mr. Untouchable. Note the parallels to the story of Frank Lucas and his cocaine empire dramatized in American Gangster.

White powder piled on a table for measuring with playing cards, brief scenes of dealing and cooking heroin in a spoon as well as drawing up the drug in a syringe. (1:01)

Packages of heroin, intravenous injection of the drug. (0:02)

Intravenous injection of heroin. More scenes of measuring large quantities of white powder. (0:10)

Nicky Barnes tells us, "I used to be a drug addict." (0:11)

More scenes of intravenous injection of heroin. (0:12, 0:13, 0:17)

Spoons of white powder. (0:29)

Barnes describes use of phencyclidine and its effects on his sexual experience. (0:39)

Using a razor to make lines of cocaine on a mirror. (0:50)

Crack cocaine: injection and in a pipe for smoking. (1:11)

heroin | phencyclidine