Mental illness has appeared frequently as a major theme or background element in film.
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A striking feature of the overwhelming majority of fictional (as distinct from documentary) film presentations of psychiatric disorders is their gross distortion of the phenomena ostensibly portrayed. The films that do most closely adhere to psychiatric reality include some that are based on actual persons, such as two French films starring Isabelle Adjani as Camille Claudel and as Adèle Hugo, daughter of Victor Hugo (The Story of Adele H.).
On the other hand, some films that purport to recount authentic psychiatric cases have raised doubts. Thus, psychiatrist Herbert Spiegel, who consulted in the "Sybil" case, has stated the view that Shirley Ardell Mason ("Sybil") had been manipulated by her Freudian psychiatrist, Dr. Cornelia B. Wilbur, into acting like a person with dissociative identity disorder ("mulitiple personality disorder").[1]
Among the least convincing "serious" films, especially at several decades' removed from their production, are those that attempt to be didactic, such as Spellbound, The Snake Pit and Whirlpool.