An unfortunate reality about life is that one in four adults suffers from some form of diagnosable mental illness. However, as common as it is in the real world, mental illness is often not portrayed in a way that’s believable, or sympathetic to those afflicted in film and television. So when a film comes along that so accurately portrays a character that’s “going through it,” it resonates with members of the audience who are similarly afflicted with the psychological distress that’s unfolding on the screen.
2011’s Young Adult, starring Charlize Theron, is one such film. Throughout the course of Young Adult, we see Theron’s character, Mavis Gary, an alcoholic ghostwriter of a somewhat popular young adult series, make a series of misguided decisions that cause harm to others, as well as herself. But as the film unfolds, and we learn what’s going on in her head vs what’s happening around her, we become sympathetic to her issues. Though Mavis commits a number of unspeakable acts throughout the film, we don’t hate her. In fact, it’s quite the opposite, because Young Adult does a brilliant job of capturing her struggles in a way that evokes sympathy for our troubled protagonist. Though we all know the saying that mental illness isn’t your fault, but it is your responsibility, we can’t help but feel troubled ourselves as we see Mavis make misguided attempt after misguided attempt to reconnect with her old flame instead of growing up when she visits her hometown.
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Substance Abuse (Namely Alcohol) as a Coping Method
An ever present through line in Young Adult is drinking, and heavily at that. When Mavis Gary takes a trip to her hometown in an attempt to rekindle her relationship with Buddy (Patrick Wilson), she runs into Matt Freehauf (Patton Oswalt). She befriends Matt when she runs into him at a bar, and she learns about his life after high school. Matt is confined to a wheelchair after being nearly beaten to death in high school, a traumatic event that he rightfully has trouble dealing with later in life. Though they ran with different crowds when they were younger, they form a friendship in their misery, and this involves quite a bit of drinking.
Matt has somewhat made peace with his station in life, and he is an avid hobbyist when it comes to distilling whiskey and listening to hair metal in his garage. While Matt does occasionally get lost in the sauce, he’s truly passionate about the process of making whiskey, but the only thing Mavis is passionate about is drinking it. This codependent friendship often results in Mavis getting a little too far gone and making regrettable decisions, including crashing her mini-cooper into the light post outside the hotel she’s staying at while she visits Mercury, Minnesota.
Inflated Sense of Self When Manic, Deflated Sense of Self While Depressed
Though a formal diagnosis is never explicitly revealed in Young Adult, the subtext shows the audience that Mavis is afflicted with manic-depression (medically known as bipolar disorder), some unaddressed trauma that isn’t fully revealed until the end of the film, and maybe just a hint of narcissism. Though she never outright says she has mental health issues, it’s evident, to say the least. In her efforts to win over Buddy, who is now married, a new father, and looking like he’s living a full life, she goes on a number of shopping sprees to make sure she has a stunning wardrobe, and looks the part of a super-successful young adult writer.
Through several montages, we see Mavis doing her hair and makeup while burning through her credit card to keep up appearances. However, when her actions backfire, and she ends up back at Matt’s place drinking herself into blackout territory like Nicolas Cage in Leaving Las Vegas, falling apart, and slipping back into a depression. The following mornings, she finds herself at the “KenTacoHut” drowning her sorrows with combo meals from all three franchises (KFC, Taco Bell, and Pizza Hut).
Compulsive Hair Pulling (Trichotillomania)
It’s one thing to attempt to portray mental illness in a film, but Charlize Theron has mastered the craft. Whether she’s had issues in her own personal life that she wanted to bring into Young Adult, or she simply did her research, her portrayal of Mavis Gary is so convincing, that she even brought in a number of nervous ticks; most notably is how she plays with her hair. When under severe stress, Mavis compulsively pulls at her hair, but it’s not overdone. The condition is known as Trichotillomania, and manifests when Mavis is ramping up throughout the film. This nervous tick literally comes to a head when she pulls out a clump of hair in a bout of frustration.
Mavis’ Narrations Often Contradict What’s Being Shown on Screen
As the title Young Adult implies, Mavis Gary is a moderately successful young adult author (well, ghostwriter) for a once popular series that is coming to an end. At the beginning of the film, through a voicemail from her editor (voiced by J.K. Simmons), we learn that she’s past her deadline on the final installment of the fictional Waverly Prep series. In fact, it’s her writer’s block, as well as the newly obtained knowledge that her ex, Buddy, is now a father, that prompts her to visit Mercury.
The entire film has a voice-over narration in Mavis’ voice, and in a way she’s working out the plot for the story she needs to write. However, the narration is often contradictory to what’s happening around her. Though she speaks of the protagonist in a positive light while on screen, she’s often engaging in reckless and selfish behavior, namely trying to break up Buddy’s marriage. This form of visual juxtaposition shows the viewer that her sense of reality is fractured, and that her self-image is distorted. One of the reasons Young Adult is so brilliant is that it doesn’t beat these storytelling mechanisms over the viewer’s head. To say it’s completely subtle would be an exaggeration, but it’s the stark contrast between Mavis’ perception of herself and how her relationships actually unfold that makes the viewer sympathize with her. As we learn about her past relationship with Buddy, and we see where she’s at in life as a single 37-year-old, we have no choice but to feel bad for Mavis, and hope she finds the clarity she so desperately needs.
Audience Cares About Mavis Despite Her Behavior, Because She’s Truly “Going Through It”
At the end of the film, in an epic meltdown, Mavis spills her guts at Buddy and Beth Slade’s baby naming ceremony. At this point in the film, we’re ready to completely write off Mavis because she has only committed acts that make her character seem completely irredeemable. However, in a drunken, profanity-laden tirade, she reveals that she miscarried Buddy’s child years ago, which started her spiral, and it’s evident that she’s carried that trauma for all these years. When she asks buddy, point-blank, why he invited her, he admits that Beth asked him to because she simply felt bad for Mavis.
This is the “a-ha” moment that viewers were waiting for, and it truly pays off. In an instant, we realize that deep down, Mavis is actually a good person, but she clearly has severe psychological issues that she needs to work through, and the visit to Mercury only made things worse for her. In her mind, it was supposed to be her kid, her happy marriage with Buddy, and her life that’s free of the trauma she endured so many years ago.
Writer’s Block That’s the Result of All of the Above
For those of you who dabble with writing, or do it for a living, you know that writer’s block is a rite of passage in a way; staring at a blank page with a story to tell, but without the proper way to articulate it is as demoralizing as it gets if you can’t bring yourself to step away from a project, and look at the big picture known as life to get a healthy perspective on things. We see this happen to Mavis in spades throughout the film. As she desperately clings onto her past life to find inspiration for the Waverly Prep series she’s about to wrap up, we find her drinking herself into a stupor, finding herself unable to let go of her past, binging on fast food, and slugging Diet-Coke straight from the two-liter as she tries to figure out what kind of story she wants to tell. Unfortunately for Mavis, her own story is of a broken person who desperately needs somebody to talk to, so she can work through her issues.
At its heart, Young Adult is a comedy, but it tackles some serious issues when it comes to mental illness. While we all look on in horror as Mavis visits her hometown and wreaks havoc, we cringe at her actions, but can’t help but feel bad for her. But this is all done tastefully because if we were in Mavis’ shoes, we can’t say with certainty that we’d act any differently. And that’s why Young Adult resonates with so many people; it’s real, it’s hard to look at, but it’s sympathetic, and it truly shows us the nuance that’s involved when somebody is going through a mental health crisis.
