[MattBemis]

I wasn't sure where to put this but this seemed like the best spot.

I'm sure most of us know the trope known as the Manic Pixie Dream Girl. It's a character of a girl in films who is cute, quirky, funny, dreamy, and well, manic. A couple examples of Manic Pixie Dream Girls are Kate Winslet in Eternal Sunshine for the Spotless Mind (I think she's the spot on stereotype) and Natalie Portman in Garden State.

My question is what is this tropes effect on the publics view ok Bipolar disorder. Do you think these characters are an accurate potrayal of certain people with Bipolar disorder? Do you think it has a positive or negative effect on people's perception of the disease? Do you these characters are one dimensional or just in the throughs of a manic episode? I'm interested to hear everyone's thoughts on this

[CANDC]

Matt, the positive part is that people learn more about conditions they have no knowledge of.

The negative is that people get a stereotypical image that may not be true to life.

Better than death and violence by a long shot!

I would say that it's a positive if people come away from the experience of watching the movie with greater knowledge of the illness or with some awareness that the person has an illness. However, I just don't see that happening in these movies. The trope seems to play up the character as having desirable behavior that does not come from an illness. The manic pixie dream girl (boy) is usually there to save someone from their humdrum existence. And these characters don't ever seem to have too many consequences for their often bizarre behavior. I've noticed that people come out of these movies thinking that the manic behavior is often a desirable way to behave and not that this person has issues.

I do think that the portrayals are accurate in some of these movies. However, I believe that in real life people would point out that this person is manic and not acting like their baseline selves. Instead it seems in these movies that no one ever points out that the person is behaving in a manic manner. They're just quirky and cute. I think that the trope is just too one dimensional.

The originator of the phrase explains
I?m sorry for coining the phrase ?Manic Pixie Dream Girl? - Salon.com

[MattBemis]

I do think that most of the cha racers that fit this trope are one dimensional, but some of their behaviors are good examples of mania.

I just watched Silver Lining Playbook for the first time last night and obviously that's a much more accurate potrayal of bipolar and mental illness in general. The movie actually showed the consequences of manic behavior. It was a very accurate potrayal of mental illness and bipolar disorder in general.