Sunday, August 14, 2016

Side Effects (2013)

SideEffects2013Poster.jpg  If this is the kind of shit Steven Soderbergh is going to put out, maybe he should stay retired.

Psychiatrist Dr. Jonathan Banks (Jude Law) prescribes a depressed patient (Rooney Mara) a new drug, one of the side effects of which is sleepwalking.  The patient murders her husband (Channing Tatum) while sleepwalking and is remanded to an institution instead of jail.  Dr. Banks finds his life coming apart at the seams as he is labeled as the guy who gave the pills to a killer.  Determined to prove he was justified, he looks deeper into the background of the patient and uncovers a trail leading to her previous therapist (Catherine Zeta-Jones).

This was supposed to be a thriller, I'm sure.  It is in no way thrilling.  It meanders into boring several times.  I think it was also supposed to be a condemnation of the pharmaceutical industry, pumping out drugs, paying doctors for trials and endorsements, and playing down potentially dangerous side effects.  It doesn't do a great job there, either.  Mostly what it does is show how utterly disturbing it is when people in positions of public trust, like doctors, abuse their power.  It is almost impossible to fight after being declared crazy.  Most people who are non compos mentis are so crazy it's obvious to a layman but wrongfully diagnosed people are just screwed.  Making a movie that glorifies a doctor putting the screws to a patient for trying to fuck him over is not entertaining to me.

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