Manic (film)
Encyclopedia
Manic is a 2001 American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 drama
Drama
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance. The term comes from a Greek word meaning "action" , which is derived from "to do","to act" . The enactment of drama in theatre, performed by actors on a stage before an audience, presupposes collaborative modes of production and a...

 film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...

 directed by Jordan Melamed and written by Michael Bacall
Michael Bacall
Michael Bacall is an American screenwriter and actor. He acted in movies and television from an early age. Turning to writing in the 2000s, he co-wrote and co-starred in Manic...

 and Blayne Weaver
Blayne Weaver
Blayne Weaver is an American actor and writer, born in Bossier City, Louisiana.Weaver began to perform in the children's theater group The Peter Pan Players in Shreveport, Louisiana. His first major film performance was in the independent film Where the Red Fern Grows ...

. It was shown at several film festival
Film festival
A film festival is an organised, extended presentation of films in one or more movie theaters or screening venues, usually in a single locality. More and more often film festivals show part of their films to the public by adding outdoor movie screenings...

s in 2001 and 2002, including the Sundance Film Festival
Sundance Film Festival
The Sundance Film Festival is a film festival that takes place annually in Utah, in the United States. It is the largest independent cinema festival in the United States. Held in January in Park City, Salt Lake City, and Ogden, as well as at the Sundance Resort, the festival is a showcase for new...

. The region 1
DVD region code
DVD region codes are a digital-rights management technique designed to allow film distributors to control aspects of a release, including content, release date, and price, according to the region...

 DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....

 was released January 20, 2004. This is also the first time Gordon-Levitt and Deschanel have worked together as each other's main interest in a film, the second being (500) Days of Summer.

Plot

Lyle Jensen (Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Joseph Leonard Gordon-Levitt is an American actor whose career as both a child and adult has included television series and theatrical films....

) is admitted to the juvenile psychiatric ward of a hospital after beating another teen with a baseball bat during a baseball game; the other teen thought "it was funny" that Lyle's father was physically abusive. It's Dr. David Monroe's (Don Cheadle
Don Cheadle
Donald Frank "Don" Cheadle, Jr. is an American film actor and producer. Cheadle rose to prominence in the late 1990s and the early 2000s for his supporting roles in the Steven Soderbergh-directed films Out of Sight, Traffic, and Ocean's Eleven...

) job to get Lyle to talk in group therapy sessions. Lyle's mother placed him in the institution against his will after the incident in hopes of helping him control his anger. Lyle is placed in a room with Kenny (Cody Lightning
Cody Lightning
Cody Lightning is a Cree Native American actor.He is son of Georgina Lightning, and brother of William Lightning and Crystle Lightning....

) a reticent, thirteen-year-old victim of child molestation and they form somewhat of a sibling relationship. Lyle has problems adjusting to the confinements of the institution; he continually has confrontations with Michael (Elden Henson
Elden Henson
Elden Henson is an American actor. He is best known for playing Fulton Reed in the Mighty Ducks trilogy with Emilio Estevez, and playing Lenny Kagan in The Butterfly Effect....

) and the two come to blows multiple times. One night, Lyle is awoken by screaming; Tracy (Zooey Deschanel
Zooey Deschanel
Zooey Claire Deschanel is an American actress, musician, and singer-songwriter. In 1999, Deschanel made her film debut in Mumford, followed by her breakout role as young protagonist William Miller's troubled older sister Anita in Cameron Crowe's 2000 semi-autobiographical film Almost Famous...

), another patient, has recurring nightmares of her rape.

Lyle finds himself attracted to Tracy, but she is reluctant to become close to him due to her low self-esteem and her fear of him. While in their room at night, Kenny and Lyle began a discussion about their fathers, at which point Kenny announces that his stepfather is going to visit him. When Kenny's stepfather visits, Kenny is hesitant to be left alone in a room alone with him, and the audience later finds out that the stepfather molests him. Due to a confrontation between Dr. Monroe, Kenny, and his stepfather, Kenny is transferred to another unit of the institution, leaving Lyle without a roommate. Lyle becomes upset when he hears of the sexual abuse, so in an attempt to comfort him, Tracy apologizes for the situation. This sets Lyle off and he pushes her against the wall. After she begins crying, he throws himself at her and kisses her, which causes her to run off. After the incident, a group meeting takes place in which the patients and Dr. Monroe discuss about their worries and the situation with Kenny. Michael feels no remorse for Kenny and states that he received what he deserved. At this point, Lyle jumps up and attacks Michael, but the guards pull them apart. Dr. Monroe becomes upset at Lyle and begins throwing chairs around the room, demonstrating to Lyle that reacting out of anger accomplishes nothing. The two later have a conversation in which the doctor points out the similarities between Lyle and his abusive father.

During his stay, Lyle forms a friendship with Chad (Michael Bacall
Michael Bacall
Michael Bacall is an American screenwriter and actor. He acted in movies and television from an early age. Turning to writing in the 2000s, he co-wrote and co-starred in Manic...

) and the two make plans to go to Amsterdam with the money from Chad's trust fund. Chad and another patient, Sara (Sara Rivas) have an argument over Van Gogh's painting "Wheat Field with Crows
Wheat Field with Crows
Wheatfield with Crows is a July 1890 painting by Vincent van Gogh. It is commonly but mistakenly stated that this was Van Gogh's last painting...

." Sara states that the painting represents freedom, while Chad states that the painting represents depression and confinement because of the borders on the painting and the fact that the road leads to nowhere. When it comes close to Chad's eighteenth birthday, he backs out of the plan to go to Amsterdam stating that running off to another place will not change his life, however, he encourages Lyle to go ahead without him. The day before his release, Chad attacks one of the guards and cuts the guard's neck causing him to be removed from the ward. During the scuffle between Chad and the guard, the guard drops his keys, which Lyle takes without notice. That night, Lyle uses his key to get into Tracy's room. He apologizes and the two embrace.

The day of his escape, Lyle searches for Tracy, whether or not he wanted to say goodbye or to bring her along on the trip is uncertain. Unable to find her, he asks Michael of her whereabouts. Michael inquires if Lyle has raped Tracy yet since "she wants it." This enrages Lyle to the point that he breaks into Michael's room and attacks him, leaving him lying bloody in a corner. When he leaves Michael's room, he sees Tracy and tells her that he was looking for her. She says nothing and does nothing as he unlocks the door of the institution and runs out the gate. Lyle leaves the institution thinking that it is no place for him since there is nothing wrong with him. He waits at the bus terminal and when it pulls up, there is a poster of Van Gogh's "Wheat Field with Crows" on the side of it. Seeing the painting, Lyle is reminded of the argument between Chad and Sara. Lyle does not board the bus, instead he walks back to the institution.
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