Sybil

“Sybil” is a movie that talks about dissociative identity disorder (DID). Different from other similar movies that exaggerate the horrible effects lead by certain extreme personality, “Sybil” portrays the real conditions of a patient who suffers with dissociative identity disorder. It educates people about the pains and sufferings experienced by a DID’s patient in real life and also the treatments that they go through in order to sustain their lives with many personalities. Besides the patient, it also shows the procedures of the therapist in conducting the psychotherapy towards DID’s patient. 

Sybil, who is the main character in the movie, is being diagnosed with dissociative personality disorder by her psychiatrist, Dr Wilbur. In the beginning, Sybil has no idea that she is suffering with DID, although she has lots of memory gaps in a day and often wakes up in doing something she does not know. Her life is in a mess as she could not manage her relationship, job and financial issues. These terrify her, which leads her seeking help from Dr Wilbur. There are 14 personalities that share Sybil body, including her primary personality. Each personality shows dissimilarities with her primary personality and handles different roles. There is a dominant personality, Vickie, who knows everything about all personalities; a frightened little girl, Peggy, who symbolizes Sybil’s anger and rage towards the abuses caused by her mother during childhood; a music-talented and passionate young girl, Vanessa, who helps Sybil in building a love relationship; a depressed personality, Marcia, who always wants for suicidal; an infant, Ruthie, where Sybil will regress into when she feels frightened; and other more personalities that do not show clearly in the movie. Each personality emerges with a reason and symbolises something that Sybil supresses for long time without she knowing. Therefore, she is not aware of these personalities and the trauma that she experienced during childhood until she is being revealed by Dr Wilbur. The cause of this disorder can be explained by the childhood trauma caused by her mother when she was young. Being abused and neglected by her mother who is diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, Sybil first suffers with post-traumatic stress disorder, which later develops dissociative personality disorder. The causation reveals in this movie suites the suggested cause of having DID, which is childhood trauma and the symptoms showed also match with the symptoms proposed in Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). In other words, “Sybil” manages to portray the real conditions and suffers experienced by a patient of DID in normal life, without exaggerating some personalities in order to catch the audiences’ attention. 

Besides displaying the life of a patient with DID, this movie also portrays the life of a therapist in helping her client to deal with the disorder. Dr Wilbur, who is the psychiatrist of Sybil, helps Sybil a lot in order to cope with her disorder. She talks with different personalities and understand the underlying meaning of the existence of each personality. She uses hypnosis to find out the trauma that Sybil went through when she was young. She even handles the personality who has suicidal ideation and immediately rushes towards Sybil when she receives calls that she is going to commit suicide. In order to help Sybil to unite all her personalities together, she reveals to Sybil that she has DID, and leads her to accept the existence of all her personalities and face with her childhood trauma that she has forgotten. Although she has somehow broken the ethical rules of being a therapist, which is not forming the relationship beyond therapist-client relationship, all she did manages to help Sybil to face with her disorder. From her sacrifices and strong wishes to help her client, I realize that it is uneasy to be a therapist, especially when facing with patients who have severe mental disorders and conducting long-term psychotherapy which may last for years. Lots of patience and tolerance are required, together with lots of related knowledge and years of experience. These therefore enlighten me to be prepared and learn to be tolerance before I serve people as a therapist in future. 

In summary, “Sybil” is a nice movie to be watched as it reveals the life of people who suffered with DID. It educates people not to be bias and have discrimination towards these people as they are just normal people who also need love and attention from others. Some of them might not be aware of their disorder and suffered with lots of pains and fears. If this case, family and friends should provide support and help when they needed the most, but not abandoning them and leaving them alone because of fear. Social support would definitely help them to cope better and face their disorder bravely and confidently.

Schindler's List

            “Schindler’s List” is a documentary movie that portrays how are the Polish Jews being mistreated and killed during World War II. There are lots of killing being shown in the movie, telling the audiences that human lives are just so tiny when war occurs. It also displays human’s nature of survival, where people would do anything in order to survive. 

            During that period of time where the militaries hold the authority, people’s lives could be changed easily based on their single decision. The Jews are forced to leave their homes and being killed or sent to the concentration camp due to the bias and discrimination from the German’s authorities. The soldiers could even kill whoever they like without having any reasons. For example, Amos Goth, who is the SS second lieutenant that being assigned to look after the concentration camp, kills the Jews randomly in the concentration camp when he thinks that they could no longer serve as a manpower. He and his men even make fun on the people who are being locked on the train and prepared to be sent to kill.  From their behaviours, I wouldn’t say that they have lost their humanity, but they are numbed towards killing. They have been educated to kill their enemies, and people in concentration camp are being seen as “enemy” as they think that Jews outstand them a lot. The guns in their hands have been mistreated to kill their own people, even though they do not admit it. 

            From the Jews, I could see human’s nature sense of survival and how it drives them to keep themselves alive. One single military order has made all Polish Jews lost their homes, and many of them even lost their lives. In order to survive, they try hard to prove that they deserve to stay as they are useful towards the country. Many of them are forced to hide when the soldiers are catching them to send them to the concentration camp. In the concentration camp, they are being mistreated badly. Anyone who is considered as “not essential” would be killed. During the medical check, they are humiliated to run nakedly in the public square. Women even put some blood on their faces just to make them look healthier in order to stay in the concentration camp. The children even hide themselves in the toilets and cover with feces to prevent themselves from being send away from their parents. Due to the fear of death, no one is dare to stand up and challenge authorities. They can only obey their demands and work hard in order to survive. 

            They are two type of people in the movie: the person who holds the authority to kill, and the person who tries very hard to avoid being killed. However, the main character of the movie, Oskar Schindler, does not represent either one of these people. He plays the role of saviour when the Jews are being ordered to be killed. In the beginning, he is just a business man who wants to be success. He builds good relationships with the military officers and offers the job to the Jews as they are cheap to be hired. However, his mind changes after he sees lots of killing. With his accountant, they try to seek people out from the concentration camp by giving bribe to the officer. They come out with the Schindler’s list and save lots of Jews’ lives when they realize that the last murderer is coming. His actions save lots of lives although in the end, he leaves with broke. It is his humanity that saves him from being killed when the Nazis’ fail. 

            From this move, I can see different kinds of humanity and how they affect each person to act. The soldiers still remain the sense humanity even though they have been used to killing, therefore they leave Schindler’s factory without conducting their duty to kill. The Jews’ strong sense of survival keeps them alive in the end. Schindler’s respect towards lives drives him to save the Jews from being killed. In the period of time where war begins, a sense of humanity becomes such a precious thing as it will keep people to stay alive and stop the war from continuing.