Sunday, 18 May 2014

Execution of Multiple Personality Disorder

Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) also known as Multiple Personality Disorder is a severe condition for the patient which there will be two or more distinct identities, or personality states that are present in and alternately take control of an individual. The person may experiences memory loss from the alternate changes from each personality.

Movies can be relate to this disorder are Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, Sybil, Fight Club, Psycho and Identity. These movies projected the transition of a harmless person into wild and dangerous. Any execution of the movie portraying DID is fascinating, because any way had use can add on the feel of intense and mystery to the movie, bringing the audience to a different experience.

One of the execution is that actor need to act different significant character themselves to show the drastic change of the person. This is going to test the acting skill of the actor. It is a really psychopathic way for the actor to not focus on 1 character but many within the same time. The audience can easily identify the person with DID and excited to react with the sudden change of the character bringing the twist to the plot.


However, another way bring more mystery to the audience, they will not know the protagonist suffer DID until the end of the movie. Fight Club and Identity is the good example for this kind of execution. We thought the protagonist communicate with various characters in the movie, but in fact they are the same person. Very good twist and surprising for us to watch. The writer need to be carefully write the plot as some hints need to slowly expose out to not lead much confusion in the end of the movie.


Following kind of execution in the short film has inspired few directors to do the similar way at their film. The title of the short film is Inside, directed by Trevor Sands and had won 2 film festivals in 2002. It is about a man with DID on his way to meet a doctor for evaluation. Throughout the short film, we have seen him accompany by many people with different characteristic to meet doctor for evaluation. They are unstable, everyone wanted to speak up until they are confronted by the doctor. In the end of the short film, we realize the doctor is also one of his split personality. This twist captivates us by bringing many characters alive and let the audience to identify each split personality he have, then the hook is at the doctor calming the others also one of his split character.


This execution shows up many characters with different sizes, gender and personalities coming alive accompany the person where ever the person is at. Audience will have a clear image on the person has how many personality and what kind of characteristic. It looks like a group of people stick together and voice up in any different situation.

Wilber Pan's music video is one of the replica example by using the story of Billy with 24 personalities. Splitting aside from the dancing part, the story content is quite similar with the short film shown above. Wilber is heading to meet the doctor bringing along with many characters beside him, later the doctor herself also part of Wilber. Although the content is similar, but overall the MV has brought up a better quality with fast pace of editing and smooth story telling.


Mad Detective directed by Johnie To and Wai Ka-Fai in year 2007, had execute in a way the detective has the supernatural gift seeing a person's "inner personalities," or hidden ghosts. He uses this ability to help the rookie detective to solve a murder case. Throughout the investigation, the detective suspected an officer which has suffer from multiple personality disorder. From the suspected officer, we can see he has a total of 7 personalities which 7 different character surround him to commit crime.


Multiple personality disorder is an interesting theme, it excite our mind to start thinking and follow the story of the movie closely. We hardly predict when the characters will appear and might shock us with any action. It's unpredictable, the thrill and mystery feel of the movie is one of the pleasure for a good movie viewing experience.

No comments:

Post a Comment