prexan I ran into this amazing movie on a site where it was available for download (www.libertv.com). They didn't offer much of a commentary other than it was a documentary about a psychiatric hospital in Massachusetts. More specifically, it is a 1966 film about the realities of a state institution for criminally insane. Haunting cinematography in black and white, no overlapping commentary, as the images are powerful enough in themselves. It is deeply unsettling to see the overlapping delusional universes - the patients' and the staff's views of the world, each one right in their own eyes and at the same time utterly unable to see the reality through the eyes of the other. Also, it is unnerving to see how the professionals end up harming those they genuinely want to help. Schizophrenia is projected into the very system that is supposed to break it. The movie clearly demonstrates the system's fundamental flaw, which is its attempt to cure splitting by further splitting it (away from the world). And that may be the very reason for each, instead of mending those who suffer the system not only perpetuates sufferance but ends up broken itself.

hrising Like Mr. Pierson, I find it strange to give this movie a "10" since it is not something to see for a good time.When I saw this movie in 1972, I considered myself very lucky, since I was from Massachusetts, where it was banned, and saw it only because it was shown in my Psych class in college in New York State. We had a special showing for our class and (literally) were told not to eat before seeing the film.There was quite a bit of controversy over it, and over Bridgewater in Massachusetts back then, somehow I just assumed that the film would be available and not banned by now. The ban only protected the state of Massachusetts, really, from being portrayed as a government that ran an prison for the criminally insane where people only went in, and never came out, where prisoners were mistreated, and where the craziest person in the place was the warden. Bridgewater was used as a threat to people at the Charles Street Jail to keep in line, it was considered like a death sentence. Massachusetts probably wasn't alone, I've heard that Napa was used as a threat to people in San Quentin back then as well.How strange about it still being restricted, I hadn't thought of it in a long time and was actually researching hunger strikes when it crossed my mind. I wonder how Bridgewater in the '60s compares to anything now.

winopaul OK, the quality is pretty bad but it is watchable. I have been hoping to catch a bit-torrent of this film for the last two years. As of Sept 15 2006 is is up on Google Videos, just search Titicut. I can see a direct influence this film had on somebody that was involved with One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Highly recommended. Like a different poster, the people that run this site feel a need for me to post 10 lines of text. I guess they like loquacious people at IMDb. Am I up to ten yet? If the people that make these absurd policies need work they would be well qualified for employment as guards and head-doctors at a mental hospital. Watch the movie Skippy and then look in a mirror. And cry, IMDb Skippy, cry.

James Hayes-Bohanan, Ph.D. Not exactly the kind of movie for which star-ranking seems appropriate.As a professor at Bridgewater State College, I learned about this movie in a peculiar way: when considering a job at the college in 1997, a web search of the town name mainly yielded comments about this movie.Once I started teaching here, I learned that students did not like for us to say "Bridgewater State" because their friends back home (mostly other towns in the general region south of Boston) would always tease them about being inmates/patients at Bridgewater State Hospital. So I always say "BSC" or the full name of the college.I should say that I watched most but not all of the film. It was disturbing but not horrific. I think that the lack of dignity afforded the inmates/patients is what bothered me the most. I blame this as much on the director as on the institution itself.I like to think that 40 years later, the movie had the desired effect, though, of bringing attention to a chronically unattended problem: the treatment of mentally ill people in general and the criminally insane in particular.One last thing, as I write this while sitting in my home about three miles from the site -- in nine years of living here and being very active in the community, I have yet to meet an employee of the prison complex (which includes the State Hospital and regular prisons). I rarely hear about the movie, nor do I hear discussions of what the place might be like today.