Customer Reviews

Helen

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Sandra Nettlebeck both wrote and directed this somber, intense study about clinical depression. The film is long, is a one-note song, and is in need of editing and lightening - or is it? What Nettleback has created is an atmosphere that very likely simulates the way the world is viewed and coped with by those who are suffering from suicidal depression. It is a lesson as much as it is a film.

Helen (Ashley Judd) is a popular professor of music theory, and accomplished pianist, and the wife of handsome and successful lawyer David (Goran Visnjic), and mother of a charming teenager Julie (Alexia Fast) all of whom we meet at a surprise birthday party for Helen. But very gradually Helen begins to change from the ebullient happy woman to a more quiet, pensive, obviously injured woman. Concentration fails, she cannot get enough sleep, her connection to the world begins to crumble and finally she breaks into the depths of depression. Despite the support of David and Julie and denying the medical assistance of psychiatrist Dr. Sherman (Alberta Watson), Helen continues to sink deeper into the profound sadness of clinical depression. One of Helen's students, Mathilda (Lauren Lee Smith) seems to be one of the few people with whom Helen can relate: we are lead to discover Mathilda suffers from a similar disorder. The truth about Helen's medical history finally surfaces: she has had suicidal ideation and clinical depression in her past When married before to Frank (David Hewlett) and soon after the birth of Julie (?postpartum depression?) Helen required psychiatric hospitalization, her marriage failed, and she ultimately met David who has been the ideal husband and father for Julie. Helen escapes her home, is hospitalized and undergoes shock therapy after a suicide attempt - her only apparent understanding contact is the nebulously drawn Mathilda. How Helen emerges from her illness and reorganizes her life is the ending of the film.

The film benefits greatly from the moody musical score by Tim Despic with the aid of James Edward Barker ( and Schumann and Schubert...) and the mood is kept appropriately dark by the cinematography by Michael Bertl. The quartet of actors - Judd, Visnjic, Smith, and Fast) - are outstanding as is the well selected group of actors for supporting roles. But for this study of the depths of depression - mostly dark scenes of Helen lying in bed or weeping - is, at two hours, a bit more than an audience can handle. In order to appreciate the quality of this film the viewer must accept the fact that the main point of the film is a study of the crippling illness of depression. And that it does extremely well. Grady Harp, August 10

This movie really hits home with what people that suffer from clinical depression go through, and how they shut out those that love them most, through no fault of their own, and how family members are helpless to help them. The struggle to overcome inner demons and depression is a road that is not understood by those who do not know how debilitating this illness can be. Ashley Judd gives an outstanding performance as the professor, and Goran Visnjic is so incredibly believable as her husband, who tries to reach her and help her out of her abyss. Lauren Lee Smith plays Mathilda, Helen's student who loses her mother to the same condition, and suffers from the same depression portrays her character as the lone person that is able to understand Helen, through support and presence - Excellent.

Having lived close to the problem of bipolar depression for many years, I can say that this film captures the nuances perfectly. Bravo to the players and to the filmmaker.

This movie is about a young married woman with a teenaged daughter who at first shows herself as calm and well poised. She is gifted with the ability to play piano and to teach music to college age students. Her husband is an attorney who loves her and they have a happy upper class family life. All seems normal and a desired goal by most standards of the population. Helen is a gentle soft-spoken female who is played by Ashley Judd. This was a character role that seemed different than I have seen Ashley play at. She has acted in some movies as a strong role model, yet in Ruby she was a reflective quieter actor, still there was strength. This role was taking a well-adjusted person into a dark despairing spiral of depression and inability to cope with the world around her. The meltdown went really quickly, which didn't feel quite right. Her symptoms just came on. The trigger seemed to be her husbands manner at work one morning and a girl student she met late nite at her academy. It is hard to know for certain if thats what set her out of control feelings to surface. The rest of the movie is how she deals with the imbalance in her emotional status. She tends to try a medical route or her husband does. She seems to just be led by his decisions until finally striking out against him and those wanting to see her change. She seems to want to be accepted as is. Her lack of involvement with life is to hard for her family to watch, they want to pull her out of the feelings rather than support her process. She meets up with the artistic cello playing student who also suffers from the havoc of feelings. They bond yet her depression does not change, it is a shared connection that allows her to be herself rather than a wife or a mother. She is still holding onto the pain and using drugs to escape with sleep, but she can be in this place without any requirements to change. Her decision to take medication and let the hospital adminster ect happens from her own volition. She makes this choice somehow from the process of her unfolding depression without any pressure placed upon her. I don't like her direction of healing but I do like that she decided to act and bring forth change to her life. Change in any way brings new direction and choices to us as individuals. The things I liked about this film, I liked the reflection and processing that took place after I viewed this movie, I liked her beautiful house and all the pretty dishes, I liked the good coffee that she drank with her expensive coffee machine, I liked that she ran thru the anonomyous streets and I liked her softness and creativity with music. Another thing I liked was her connection with the younger student. It was real and love seemed to sprout from it. They had each others understanding, it wasn't meant to last forever, because change needed to happen but while it was, it felt true and meaningful to both girls. A very good film yet not the approach I would meander down.

This is a great movie about a subject few want to know about and to which there is huge stigma. Very realistic about what it is like to have depression.

Very contrived. Felt like things were made up at the moment for shock effect. I wanted to at least like this film. Had good acting going for it but the directing and direction the film went was not made of real earth..it was made up on the spot. Not based on reality where most people who sadly step off the ladder into an oblivion of mental illness are not left to these means to flounder around for a way back...clinging to another mental ill person no way...a husband who becomes jealous and smacks the mentally ill friend just isn't going to happen. I felt I was watching one of those horrible 60-70's artsy over crafted piece of junk.....you know the type...Three in the Attic type garbage. I kept waiting for this film to get better...never did. The final straw of yet another miss direct was at the final scene....kid who looks to have never aged past her 13 year introduction is running on the beach with a full grown dog calling Macho....Macho...the name the antagonist who died had named her very young puppy...and so the question comes to mind...what happened to the other adult full grown dog the family had at the beginning. The way they suggested this mental ill friend died wasn't right either. SOOOO WRONG. The surprised performance however was the character who played the father/husband role. I'd always placed him as no more than a grade B soap opera star...of ER fame. (True George Clooney came from ER....but he had a whole heap of grade D horror films under his aging belt too. When dear George left ER so did I. We never could believe it lasted as long as it did...really went downhill after the first two seasons.
Anyway this film is dark and dingy and there is no redeeming qualities worth recommending it. The film does not offer any insight into mental illness from the patients view or the family and friends....and will depress everyone. Stay away from this...I'm debating not even selling my now used copy to prevent someone else falling prey to it's misery. A real downer. And it does not depict the real life despite the systematic loosening of states and mental hospitals once used in our country....leaving many of the people to fend for themselves...it's true..most of those
end up on drugs. Many are abandoned by their relatives or worn down and out. But that wasn't what this film seemed to carry....did hint at that aspect but not the real deal on any level.
Don't walk away from it...run from it.

I removed the dvd helen from my wishlist because there wasn't enough info on it as it didn't have a rating and that is very important to me to know the rating before I buy.