Analyzing The Movie One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest

“A success, they say, but I say he’s just another robot for the Combine and might be better off as a failure…”(17).

Kesey highlights two distinctions between the roles of women in his novel ‘One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest’. He places women in two categories, the ‘Ballcutters’ and ‘Whores’ . The ‘Ballcutters’ are presented to have a dominant role over the men within the ‘Combine’ and challenges their masculinity, resulting in them being personified as machines. This is demonstrated when Bromden describes the ‘tip of each finger the same colour as her lips. Funny orange. Like the tip of a soldering iron’ of Nurse Ratched. Bromden compares the complexion of her fingers and lips with a metal iron, suggesting not only is she machine like, but also has the physical appearance of a metal machine. The ‘Whores’ are Candy and Sandy who are submissive and this stems from the introduction of the contraceptive pill, as ‘feminists encouraged sexual exploitation with multiple partners and claimed sexual pleasure as a woman’s right’, Thus, resulting into them being presented as sexual beings fulfilling the sexual appetite of men.

One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey depicts the unique story of Randle Patrick McMurphy, a war veteran turned illegal gambler who simulates a mental illness and is transferred from prison farm to mental asylum in hopes for a less restrictive, more relaxed working environment, only to discover harsh opposite of these expectations. The texts presents various themes of power, societal conflicts, law and order and freedom from rebellion. By further analysis, the divide between men and women and mysterious mind of R.P McMurphy present textual and plot devices that permit the adoption and discussion of a Feminist and Psychological critical perspective.

In the novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Ken Kesey uses machine imagery to develop the theme that society forces people to conform. The novel is able to portray machine imagery and conformity by using the Patients, Combine, and Bromden’s Dream.

Who do you know that has a brave soul to go into a mental ward because they don’t want to work on a work farm anymore? Well, that is our main character in the book, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, by Ken Kesey. The book is about a person and main character, McMurphy, coming into the mental ward because he is “crazy” when really he just doesn’t want to keep working on the work farm he was at. He tries to rebel over the head nurse, Nurse Ratched, by doing countless amounts of things to get her mad. Both Nurse Ratched and McMurphy represent power in similar and different ways. They both use the patients for manipulation. However, their differences in manipulation are different in their own ways. Nurse Ratched uses her calm smile while McMurphy uses her persuasive side. They both do use the patients for manipulation, but they use different patients. Nurse Ratched uses Billy, Harding, and the attendants. McMurphy uses the guard, Chief, and Candy. Overall, both Nurse Ratched and McMurphy use their power in a different way.

Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is a first hand account by the narrator about several weeks inside a hospital's ward for the insane. The narrator, Bromden, recounts, “ I been silent so long now it’s gonna roar out of me like floodwaters and you think the guy telling this is ranting and raving my God; you think this is too horrible to have really happened, this is too awful to be the truth! But, please. It’s still hard for me to have a clear mind thinking on it. Bu it’s the truth even if it didn’t happen.”(page 8). The book is a testament of major character transformation, following characters that transform from detached and constricted individuals to individuals who relearn how to think for themselves and tap into their natural desires. The

In order to contrast the stark, mechanized setting as well as the sadistic Nurse Ratched of the mental institution, Ken Kesey presents Randall Patrick McMurphy as a defiant, charismatic beacon of humanity within One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Inside the hospital, Nurse Ratched maintains control with a series switches and dials, “…[sitting] in [a] web of wires…managing her network with mechanical insect skill…” (30). Here, Kesey likens the nurse to a lethal arachnid, in charge of a cold, robotic environment that strips away its inhabitants’ humanity. The nurse and her staff lack empathy and use abuse, neglect, and intimidation as tools to make the patients obedient husks of men. However, the admission of Randall McMurphy introduces a contradictory

Throughout One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s nest by Ken Kesey Murphy arrives at the mental asylum to avoid working. Throughout One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest the main character McMurphy is compared, sutely at times and quite obviously at other to Jesus Christ. These comparisons are spoted throughout the book some being more obvious then others and some bearing more weight then others. The comparisons This comes into play with comparison between McMurphy and Jesus.

Ken Kesey's One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest is a creation of the socio-cultural context of his time. Social and cultural values, attitudes and beliefs informed his invited reading of his text.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest essentially narrates a fictional story possessing real world problems and situations. Each main character represents various societal issues of the 1960’s that are exemplified through characterization, with the help of Kesey’s development the individuality of the characters are noted despite the attempts of the institution to suppress them. Mental institutions served a downplayed role during this time. Attention was not being focused on the mistreatment or dehumanization of the reportedly “sick” and “crazy” patients housed in these establishments, society cast aside the disturbed patients labeling them useless for their inability to follow societal rules (Faggen). Besides the shadow that society cast on these

In the movie "one flew over the cuckoo's nest" we find some incidents of rising tension.

From all the mass media surrounding me, I’ve come up with a list of things that manifest love: deep gaze under the night sky, long walk on the beach, kiss under the mistletoe, blush when the eyes meet … images filtered by warm, gentle light with soundtrack of laughter and guitar beats. I always knew that love can be every small but precious moment in life, yet, what I didn’t know was it can also be something quite bizarre, such as a spit in someone’s food.

Some men truly believe that they are the superior gender, but this is definitely not the case. In his novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Ken Kesey proves this to be true. Since the book is centered around a group of men in a psychiatric ward, it is assumed that women are not present in the storyline. This is not the case. In fact, in this novel, not only are women present, they play a big role in the development of the story, however their role is affects the story in a negative way.

Alphy has a huge emotional outpouring towards her mother. She is committed to her mother’s way for good or bad. She is allowed to visit her mother only once in a week. Alphy do not like to break herself free from her mother’s presence. She completely depends on her mother for all her decisions. Alphy is not comfortable with friendships. She keeps both boys and girls away from her with her rude behavior. She likes to be a lone-wolf at school. Alphy does not miss any opportunity to start a fight.

While reading about insanity defense cases, a particular movie came to mind. “One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest,” was a movie about a guy who knew he was going to spend a lot of time in prison but found out that if you plead guilty by insanity, than he would end up going to a hospital instead of prison. Now, the guy wasn’t insane yet while being locked up he did many things to make people think he was insane, like eat cockroaches. Eventually, he got what he wanted and was transferred to a mental institution where he did end up going insane. The question that came to mind after reading this section, was “how sure can one be that someone is insane?” Can a criminal actually avoid prison, if they do enough to make somebody believe they are insane?