The Perks Of Being A Wallflower

The Perks of being a Wildflower movie is a great demonstration on adolescence and childhood development as it portrays how much we as humans are effected by our early childhood years and how we struggle to make sense of life while navigating through adolescence. We are molded by our environment, but also shaped by the neglect or abuse we suffer as children. The traumatic experiences are life altering and if not dealt with can have dramatic outcomes for our future. The movie has a great story line and walks the audience through the character and identity development of an adolescence. Dissecting Charlies character will be helpful in understanding that part of a human’s life and development.

‘The Perks of Being a Wallflower’ follows shy and kind-natured Charlie Kelmeckis (Logan Lerman- Percy Jackson, The Butterfly Effect) as he enters high school alone, after the recent loss of his middle school best friend to suicide. Charlie gets befriended by seniors Sam (Emma Watson- Harry Potter-Beauty and the Beast) and Patrick (Ezra Miller- Justice League, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them) and finally feels accepted.

Movies are constantly created by producers and writers to convey a particular meaning to their audience they are reaching out too. The meaning can be interpreted in several ways. For example, one can understand the meaning that was intended by the creators, or it could be an individual’s own understanding of a storyline in the movie. As a movie can be viewed through different perspectives, a dominant male named Louis Althusser created the theory of Interpellation and the Role of ISAs and RSAs to help further understand movies. Althusser’s theory explains that people in power will remain in power and others will be controlled by those in power (Hartt-Fournier, Lecture 2). Furthermore, the role of ISA, known as the Ideological State

Stephen Chbosky’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower is a coming-of-age novel about a 15-year-old boy, Charlie, who is unable to repress any emotions. The novel was first released on 1999 by MTV Books. It has quietly sold nearly half a million copies.1

We live in a society that has increasingly stomped on love, depicting it as cruel, superficial and full of complications. Nowadays it is easy for people to claim that they are in love, even when their actions say otherwise, and it is just as easy to claim that they are not when they really are. Real love is difficult to find and keeping it alive is even harder, especially when one must overcome their own anxieties and uncertainties. This is the main theme present in Russell Banks’ short story “Sarah Cole: A Type of Love Story,” as well as in “The Fireman’s Wife,” written by Richard Bausch. These narratives, although similar in some aspects, are completely different types of love stories.

In the movie, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, the main character Charlie is on a journey with his mental health. There are many high and low points, but it is obvious that he has a serious mental illness. Throughout the movie, Charlie shows many symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), which is defined as “A disorder that develops in some people who have experienced a shocking, scary, or dangerous event.” by the National Institute of Mental Health, and can be diagnosed through the DSM-IV method. Firstly, there needs to be signs of deviant behaviour. During the movie there are multiple occasions where Charlie blacks out and loses his memory. Whether it was drug, rage or anxiety included, this is still considered both deviant behaviour and a symptom of PTSD. Secondly, there needs to be signs of maladaptive behaviour. At the beginning of the movie, we see Charlie writing letters to his deceased best friend about his negative thoughts and feelings. While it is good to express these thoughts and feelings, it is not normal to articulate them to a dead person. He also experiences multiple flashbacks to the trauma he experienced from his Aunt Helen. Flashbacks are one the most common symptoms of PTSD, and can also develop other mental illnesses such as depression if not correctly treated. Lastly, there needs to be signs of personal distress, which can be seen when charlie expresses quilt about his Aunt Helen’s death before he has a blackout in the snow. When his feelings

The Perks of Being a Wallflower is a novel about coming of age that is seen through the perspective of Charlie, a young ‘wallflower’ that is starting high school and experiences the troublesome teenage life filled with drugs, sexuality and love. Charlie writes this book in a series of letters to an anonymous person. Charlie is the main protagonist of the story who is apprehensive and a kind-hearted boy however he has many problems happening in his life that he doesn’t like to concern others with “I just don’t want you to worry about me, or think you’ve met me, or waste your time anymore”. I admire Charlie because he is very considerate of others and although he is shy he overcomes this fear when he tries to find friends and step out of his comfort zone” Normally I am very shy, but (Patrick) seemed like the kind of guy you could just walk up to at a football game even though you were three years younger and not popular”. In return Charlie is rewarded with his first real friend at high school. I also admire Charlie for his mature attitude towards finding new friends and moving on from the death of his friend Michael. Charlie really needed to start interacting more with people, during the story we find out that Charlie misses having a friend and that being alone can be difficult and cause negative effects “It would be very nice to have a friend again. I would like that even more than a date”. I think

was at a party) and voiced that you think that your Aunt Helen's death was your fault. Knowing

The Perks of Being a Wallflower is the story of a unique high school student named Charlie and his journey of self-discovery throughout his freshman year. Charlie’s personality changes drastically from the beginning of the book to the end of it; and this is what I want to focus on. First I am going to detail Charlie’s personality at the beginning of the book and then use Erik Erikson’s theory of Psychosocial Development, Kohlberg’s theory of Moral Development, Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development and an article about adolescent bulling to analyze them. I will then use examples from the book and film to illustrate his growth in the respected areas. Through these major theories of psychology I will show Charlie’s evolution from a wallflower to a human being.

The book and the movie for The Perks of Being a Wallflower are extremely different, and I believe that the movie is much better than the book. The book is written much differently than the movie. There are lots of scenes that are in the book but not in the movie and that are in the movie not the book. The movie focuses less on the bigger, depressing topics than the book does. The characters in the movie are also much different than they are in the book. Their personalities are very different in the movie than the author described them as in the book.

For my paper, I am diagnosing Charlie from the film, Perks of Being a Wallflower. Before I delve into Charlie’s diagnosis, I will provide some background information about his character. In the film, Charlie is a 15 year old boy who has recently started high school as a freshman. He lives with both parents, and his sister who is a couple years older than him. Charlie also has a brother who has gone away to college. In school, Charlie is seen to be good with academics, particularly in English, since he has an interest in writing. However, Charlie does not have any friends and his best friend had kill himself in the last year. Furthermore, Charlie is seen to be quite socially awkward around his peers and usually keeps to himself.

A lot have people have been nervous about their freshman year but eventually we all make friends and end off the year with a lot of great weird and sometimes depressing memories.

Sociology is the scientific study of being behavior in human groups (Schaefer). There are very many examples of sociology in the movie The Perks of Being a Wallflower, but I view alienation, deviance, and gender roles to be the most prominent. This movie is about the struggles of a teenage boy named Charlie’s freshman year of high school. Charlie is seen as a social outcast and he just barely makes it through the year with the help of his best friends Sam and Patrick. Throughout the movie Charlie experiences most of the basic struggles of starting high school and some. This movie is very relateable since it gives a more realistic view of high school for some people. Charlie , and the audience, learns the importance of love and friendship in growing up in today’s society.

Witnessing or experiencing traumatic events are normally followed by stress reactions, but when those reactions continue for longer than a month that is when an individual is diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, typically referred to by its acronym PTSD. Traumatic events include sexual assault, child abuse, domestic violence, near death experiences and a variety of other traumatic events. PTSD is characterized by three main symptoms: re-experiencing the event, avoidance of triggers, and increased arousal (“Symptoms of PTSD”). The novel, Perks of Being a Wallflower, is written in diary format which allows the reader to be exposed to Charlie’s inner thoughts.

Loneliness is a feeling that everyone will experience at some point in their life. Loneliness can be felt even when you’re in a room full of people. In “The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” the characters, including Charlie, are no exception to this feeling of being lonely. Teenagers are probably the age group that has this feeling the most. This a time in life that you are changing, the people around you are changing, and you’re finally growing up and maturing and each person handles these changes differently. We each will feel this as some point as we grow and realize that the things and the people that we have grown accustomed to won’t be there anymore because it’s time for us to experience new things in life.