Titicut Follies for me is an exploration of the human condition in general, an empathetic approach to both prisoners and staff in a hospital for the criminally insane (asyla have often been used as metaphors for society and it's power structures, since Poe's tale "The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether"). It's also a reforming film, a quiet condemnation of the treatment of the prisoners in a systematic sense. The prisoners are kept naked seemingly for a lot of the time. It's not really clear why this is, and it's humiliating for them (they are covering up their modesty, and so they are aware of loss of dignity). On the other hand I'm sure that however inappropriate, it's done for (doubtlessly foolhardy) reasons of practicality (none of the guards want to look at naked prisoners all day I'm sure).
There's bullying of a patient called Jim, an old man, who is asked questions repetitively, and then when he answers the guards pretend not to hear him and ask him to repeat himself. It's the kind of bored casual bullying that even bright well-adjusted emotionally intelligent kids slip into at school, "oh there's the weird up kid, let's push their buttons and see which whistles blow and which bells ring". It's not right, but it's a systematic failure, and typical of human behaviour, rather than the results of calculated actions by a group of twisted sadists.
The chief guard appears to have a degree of megalomania, he wants all the applause at the follies and likes to be the centre of attention, and is apparently kind of put off when a nurse is showing a letter of thanks from a patient because he's no longer the centre of attention. I think he would of made a good TV host, but he wound up in a prison, so probably has issues with that.
I was worried about voyeurism at one point. A man is force fed because he has refused to eat for three days and is skeletal, he is dead before the end of filming, and there is a match cut of him on the bed in the hospital after feeding to a picture of his corpse. That seems a little irresponsible to me. I don't see any critical context, if a patient has become insensible, surely it's irresponsible to let them die? The force feeding is not pleasant for sure, but it's not insufferable in my opinion. If the man had made clear his wish to die, then that's another matter entirely.
One really effective criticism for me is that there is man who clearly doesn't belong in Titicut. He complains a lot to the doctors that the place is causing a problem for him that wasn't already there, and that he just needs to be sent back to the normal prison. He's an articulate individual and I was convinced by him. The panel of doctors he was talking to were pretty much ignoring him. He's telling them that the drugs he's on are reacting badly with him. At the end of the hearing the doctor is recommending his dosage of tranquilisers be upped (that really is insane). The man is capable of a lot of restraint, he's being ignored, and when the doctors interrupt him mid-flow and beckon for him to be taken out of the room he just goes. Me, you, and almost anyone else would have gone ballistic in the same situation. It seems he's been sent there because he complained that the coffee at the prison was being drugged, which apparently is a paranoid delusion, well they have done that at prisons a lot in the past, and I think they still do it today. Even if he's wrong, what the hell is he being sent to a hospital for the criminally insane for just for that? There's a suggestion which isn't fully fleshed out that certain individuals are there for being black and uppity, and some for being communist. It's hard to comment on that further when the film doesn't devote to much time to it, but that's the impression I got.
The entertainment that is referred to in the title isn't a point of concern for me. There are a group of songs that the inmates perform. I didn't think there was any manipulation here. Their faces are very unguarded and they are very nervous during the performance, but you can see as soon as they have finished their song the relief and glee, it's probably the only time they'll be happy all year.
I'm fond of DW Griffiths' aspiration that film could change the world, and guess what, that's what Wiseman's film did, there were directly-provoked reforms the year after the film was made. To what extent I don't know, but he achieved something there. It's undoubtedly one of the great documentaries.
One last word is that people are apparently ignoring the main meaning of the word follies, which would be a plural of folly: "the state or quality of being foolish; lack of understanding or sense." That is what is going on at the institution, government by folly.
This film, and pretty much all of Wiseman's films are available directly from Zipporah films on DVD, and are not stocked by Amazon.
There's bullying of a patient called Jim, an old man, who is asked questions repetitively, and then when he answers the guards pretend not to hear him and ask him to repeat himself. It's the kind of bored casual bullying that even bright well-adjusted emotionally intelligent kids slip into at school, "oh there's the weird up kid, let's push their buttons and see which whistles blow and which bells ring". It's not right, but it's a systematic failure, and typical of human behaviour, rather than the results of calculated actions by a group of twisted sadists.
The chief guard appears to have a degree of megalomania, he wants all the applause at the follies and likes to be the centre of attention, and is apparently kind of put off when a nurse is showing a letter of thanks from a patient because he's no longer the centre of attention. I think he would of made a good TV host, but he wound up in a prison, so probably has issues with that.
I was worried about voyeurism at one point. A man is force fed because he has refused to eat for three days and is skeletal, he is dead before the end of filming, and there is a match cut of him on the bed in the hospital after feeding to a picture of his corpse. That seems a little irresponsible to me. I don't see any critical context, if a patient has become insensible, surely it's irresponsible to let them die? The force feeding is not pleasant for sure, but it's not insufferable in my opinion. If the man had made clear his wish to die, then that's another matter entirely.
One really effective criticism for me is that there is man who clearly doesn't belong in Titicut. He complains a lot to the doctors that the place is causing a problem for him that wasn't already there, and that he just needs to be sent back to the normal prison. He's an articulate individual and I was convinced by him. The panel of doctors he was talking to were pretty much ignoring him. He's telling them that the drugs he's on are reacting badly with him. At the end of the hearing the doctor is recommending his dosage of tranquilisers be upped (that really is insane). The man is capable of a lot of restraint, he's being ignored, and when the doctors interrupt him mid-flow and beckon for him to be taken out of the room he just goes. Me, you, and almost anyone else would have gone ballistic in the same situation. It seems he's been sent there because he complained that the coffee at the prison was being drugged, which apparently is a paranoid delusion, well they have done that at prisons a lot in the past, and I think they still do it today. Even if he's wrong, what the hell is he being sent to a hospital for the criminally insane for just for that? There's a suggestion which isn't fully fleshed out that certain individuals are there for being black and uppity, and some for being communist. It's hard to comment on that further when the film doesn't devote to much time to it, but that's the impression I got.
The entertainment that is referred to in the title isn't a point of concern for me. There are a group of songs that the inmates perform. I didn't think there was any manipulation here. Their faces are very unguarded and they are very nervous during the performance, but you can see as soon as they have finished their song the relief and glee, it's probably the only time they'll be happy all year.
I'm fond of DW Griffiths' aspiration that film could change the world, and guess what, that's what Wiseman's film did, there were directly-provoked reforms the year after the film was made. To what extent I don't know, but he achieved something there. It's undoubtedly one of the great documentaries.
One last word is that people are apparently ignoring the main meaning of the word follies, which would be a plural of folly: "the state or quality of being foolish; lack of understanding or sense." That is what is going on at the institution, government by folly.
This film, and pretty much all of Wiseman's films are available directly from Zipporah films on DVD, and are not stocked by Amazon.