Shutter Island - Which would be worse, to live as a monster, or die as a good man?

When someone says "Psychology" - many people confuse it with "Psychiatry". For some reason, the broad study of how people behave, think and interact, has been narrowed down to the stereotypical - somewhat Freudian - investigation into mental disorders and abnormalities.
This stereotype has undoubtedly been reinforced over the years through the portrayal of mental illness in the media. The depiction of mental illness as a terrifying and often violent condition has created a negative stigma around an issue that desperately needs more research and attention in order to better our understanding of this relatively unknown territory.

I watched Shutter Island last night after it was recommended to me by countless people. For those that don't know, you begin watching the film under the impression that US Marshall Teddy Daniels has been called to a mental  institution on Shutter Island to investigate the disappearance of a patient named Rachel Solando. As the film progresses, you begin to doubt the goodwill of the staff at the mental institution as hints are dropped that they are experimenting on patients, which is causing their mental illnesses. Eventually, the doubt is placed upon Daniels' sanity as his flashbacks and hallucinations reveal that he is in fact a patient at the institution who has created an alternate reality for himself to escape the guilt of his previous crimes.

Whilst the film does portray the patients as violent and dangerous, the question of whether or not the film is ethical in its portrayal of mental illness is of less importance than the perhaps more relevant questions of:

At what point does a realistic portrayal of mental illness turn into a melodramatic portrayal?

As shown  by the decision to remove the sub-types of schizophrenia in the latest version of the DSM, mental illnesses are extremely difficult to categorise into a set number of characteristics. The symptoms of one disorder can greatly vary from person to person. For example, for one individual, their diagnosis of schizophrenia could be severe positive symptoms of auditory and visual hallucinations that could cause them to lash out and be violent, whereas the next individual's schizophrenia could manifest itself in negative symptoms causing them to be withdrawn and catatonic. Though some critics may argue that the portrayal of mental illness in movies is melodramatic, it could also be argued that in some cases - through no fault of their own - patients can have violent tendencies, and can be deemed to be a danger to themselves and others. However, it is fair to say that the large majority of films regarding mental illness tend to focus on this narrow view of a patient who suffers from mental illness.

A further point to be made about this film, is that by the end, the psychiatrists and doctors that run the mental institution on Shutter Island seem to be reasonable men with good intentions. This is contrasted to the stereotypical view of the mad doctor who performs (as Teddy Daniel's initially believes) ice pick transorbital lobotomies on patients to make them docile and manageable. This fact presents further issues regarding treatment of these patients. As the film is set in the 1950's, psychosurgery was one of the more practiced treatments for patients. Nowadays, drugs are administered to alter neurotransmitters and brain chemistry to restore a level of sanity to the brain. Whilst being largely effective, the treatments often result in dependence, and can cause some nasty side effects. As the cause of many mental illnesses are still unclear, many treatments serve to treat the symptoms and not the cause of the illness. 

Mental illness is a vast area of psychology, that requires far more research than is currently available. As something that negatively effects 1 in 4 people in the uk, it is no wonder people think of Psychiatry when they hear the word 'Psychology' as it is such a relevant concept that is constantly affecting the people of our society today.