The portrayal of Post-Traumatic Stress disorder (PTSD) in films, much like our understanding of mental health and how we view it, has changed as medical knowledge grew and breakthroughs were made. What may seem like bad acting or barbaric treatment now, at the time they were made (or depiction of the time being portrayed) was the normality of the situation. Officially PTSD was acknowledged as a legitimate disorder in 1980 but it has been recorded for many millennia under different terms such as “Nostalgia” “Soldier’s Heart” “Shell Shocked” and “Battle Fatigue”.  [1] The majority of PTSD films center around the horrors of war and its aftermath, more recently it has been found that it covers a wider range of traumatic events such as car crashes, terrorist attacks, physical abuse, injuries or witnessing a violent death. So more films are now being made which include these PTSD events in their plots.

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Tags: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, PTSD, The Deer Hunter, The Prince of Tides