By Genoa Barrow | OBSERVER Senior Staff Writer
Movies, particularly horror films, have historically depicted people with mental illnesses as maladjusted or criminally insane. They’re usually the first ones investigated, or scapegoated, for child abduction, rape and murder as in the case of franchise villains Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees. Over the years, mental illness has been featured on screens big and small. Here are a few memorable titles.
I don’t remember any Black people being in it, but Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 movie, “Psycho” is the ultimate display of mental illness on the big screen. The classic film stars Anthony Perkins as Norman Bates, a meek motel operator who is seemingly dominated by his mother. The shower scene becomes a common trope in horror films, but nobody does it better than the original. Bates’ delusions and murderous activities have been interpreted as being the result of schizophrenia and more recently, dissociative identity disorder.
Bill Gunn’s 1973 Black horror film, “Ganja & Hess” is a cult classic. In it an anthropologist becomes a vampire after being stabbed with an ancient dagger by his suicidal assistant, played by Gunn.
Football star-turned actor Bernie Casey stars in the 1976 film, “Dr. Black, Mr. Hyde,” a Black version of the classic Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde, about a Black doctor (Casey) whose experiments with a cell regeneration serum turn him into a crazy White man.
In “The Shining,” a 1980 horror film based on a Stephen King novel, actor/musician Scatman Scrothers plays Richard Hallorann, a hotel chef with telepathic abilities. Hallorann meets a young boy who also has special abilities, and learns that the evil spirits of the hotel have taken control of the boy’s father, played by Jack Nicholson who delivers the classic movie line, “Here’s Johnny!”
Oscar-winner Cuba Gooding, Jr. stars in the 2003 film, “Radio,” based on the true story of an intellectually challenged young man who is mistreated by members of a high school football team who goes on to become their beloved supporter and mascot figure.
In the 2009 film, “The Soloist,” Jamie Foxx plays a classically-trained musician Nathaniel Ayers who is homeless and schizophrenic. Based on a true story, Ayers is befriended by a newspaper reporter, played by Robert Downey, Jr., who struggles to “fix” him.
Rapper-turned actor Common plays Travis, a counselor in the 2016 film, “Being Charlie” about a young man who leaves drug rehab, but then has to go back to avoid jail time.
No list is complete without Denzel Washington. In the 1999 film, “The Bone Collector,” the Oscar and NAACP Image Award-winner plays a tetraplegic forensics investigator who is called upon to help catch a sadistic killer, despite being depressed and suicidal himself.
In the 1996 film, “A Thin Line Between Love And Hate,” actress Lynn Whitfield is scary in her portrayal of Brandi Webb, an unstable businesswoman who becomes obsessed with a younger lover, played by Martin Lawrence, who rejects her.
The 2000 psychological drama “Requiem for a Dream,” features Marlon Wayans in one of his first non-comedic roles. Wayans plays Tyrone C. Love, one of four characters whose drug addiction alters their physical and emotional states. Their addictions cause them to become imprisoned in a world of delusion and desperation. While in prison, Tyrone goes through painful heroin withdrawal while being subjected to psychological abuse from racist prison guards.
Two “ER” alums, Eriq LaSalle and Michael Beach star in the 2002 psychological film, “Crazy As Hell,” about a famed psychiatrist who takes a job at a state hospital. A new patient claims to need help because he’s the devil.
“HUSH (Help Us Say Help)” garnered a lot of buzz in 2022 and 2023. The 90-minute documentary from executive producer Dylan Thomas discusses the historical, social and political influences contributing to the suffering associated with mental illness in Black communities. The film company that put out “HUSH” also offers up the somber 2019 short film, “Reticent: ‘Cause Black Boys Can’t Cry.”
In “Magazine Dreams,” a film due out later this year, actor Jonathan Majors plays Killian Maddox, an up-and-coming bodybuilder who struggles to find human connection in writer/director Elijah Bynum’s exploration of celebrity and violence. Majors also played a beleaguered character in last year’s “Creed III,” who can’t let go of the past and was impacted by experiences coming of age in group homes and spending time in prison.
ON TV
In the HBO series, “I May Destroy You,” the eclectic actress and filmmaker Michaela Coel, stars as a woman experiencing post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after being drugged and raped.
Multi-talented actress Zendaya won a bevy of coveted awards for her portrayal of Rue, a queer teen who self-medicates to cope with multiple mental illnesses in the HBO series, “Euphoria.” Colman Domingo appears as Rue’s recovery sponsor and mentor.
Issa Rae’s show “Insecure” featured a love interest, Nathan, played by Kendrick Sampson, who seemingly ghosts her, but later reveals he left to deal with depression and a new bipolar disorder diagnosis.
Emmy-award winner Sterling K. Brown stars in the hit NBC drama series, “This Is Us,” playing a Black man, Randall Pearson, adopted by white parents who lost one of their triplets on the same day Randall was born at the same hospital. Randall eventually seeks therapy to deal with generational trauma and abandonment issues after years of avoidance.
On BET+’s “The Family Business,” based on a popular book series by author Carl Weber, Stan Shaw plays Larry Duncan, a man committed to a mental institution who plots revenge against his family, blaming them for his years of hospitalization.
This article is part of the Senior Staff Writer Genoa Barrow’s special series, “Head Space: Exploring The Mental Health Needs of Today’s Black Men.” The project is being supported by the USC Annenberg Center for Health Journalism and is part of “Healing California,” a yearlong reporting Ethnic Media Collaborative venture with print, online and broadcast outlets across California. The Sacramento OBSERVER is among the collaborative’s inaugural participants.