I'm really sorry for this woman and I think that she should had received some help of a psychotherapist to cope with her obsession. It's treatable.
But it's good that this movie was filmed - it can be a warning both for women - that they shouldn't care for men who aren't worth their feelings, and men - that they shouldn't hurt women, because it can end up with the obsessive-compulsive disorder.
"men - that they shouldn't hurt women, because it can end up with the obsessive-compulsive disorder."
I agree that the obsessive compulsion is treatable (if the person has the capacity for brutal self-honesty), but no one is responsible for how other people behave. A man who deliberately conducts himself in a less gallant manner is guilty of his own deeds, but a woman has to make her own choices and not blame somebody else.
As for *causing* the obsessive-compulsive disorder, in order to trigger it, the condition ALREADY EXISTS in some dormant/latent form, and needs only a catalyst: in this case, the 'perceived' attention of a desired love object. A healthy mind reacts to the disappointment in ways that don't ultimately self-destruct.
I've been there. I know what it's like to be so hung-up on a guy that it becomes all-consuming and potentially dangerous, not to mention illegal ..
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It doesn't sound like OCD at all. Just because she's obsessed, that doesn't mean she has OCD. Are you sure?
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"Pike isn't a name. It's a fish."
It's not OCD, you're right. It is in the class of conditions known as delusional disorders; specifically, "erotomania." OCD is an anxiety disorder, which is very different. Delusional disorders can be tricky to treat.
(Heh. i just realized tonight, I have corrected the misunderstading of delusional disorders on two very different boards.)
That's what made Ellena abnormal, that she honestly believed that Stillman loved her. It wasn't that she closed her eyes to the evidence, because the evidence didn't matter, and there never was any evidence to begin with - he hardly knew her. We never know what kind of man Stillman is because they never HAD an affair or even a relationship.
It's a different issue than one of an insecure woman being lied to and abused. He NEVER had ANY relationship with her. They never slept together. She just saw him and spun an entire fantasy. She believed he loved her, not because she was stupid, but because she was sick.
I love this film, and I watch it a lot. One thing I noticed on a later viewing is that when the cops come to her door and she lets them in, you can see she's living in a dump. Of course she would be. Her real life was in total disarray.
The other thing I've come to appreciate is the stilted way the characters recreated in her imagination speak. It just sounds fake. Like quoting her mother as "We must converse further on this topic!" or saying that Stillman's wife said "You will get a disease from that woman!" and referring to Ellena as a "disreputable slut." Ellena herself used big words and sometimes she did not use them correctly.
But the subject is fascinating. And I love the music!
God save Donald Duck, vaudeville and variety
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I saw the movie last night as a Lifetime Movie Network rerun. Stuck around, attracted by Elfman's name. A legal point occured to me: The Elfman character's lawyer and a couple of friends, and the doctor they consulted observed enough of her behavior to get a slant on her escapes from reality. In a case like that, what is the barrier to building an insanity defense for a person who does not agree to that line of thought? That would have been a legitimate line of inquiry. If found feasable, it could have produced results slanted more toward treatment and help, and less pointed toward punishment. Was this legally impossible, without her consent?
cmvgor
"A man does what he has to do-if he can't get out of it. - Bret Maverick's Pappy
>>>>>The warning to women should be don't sleep with married men.
She didn't sleep with him. Their whole affair was a figment of her imagination.
cmvoger, an insanity defense would be legally impossible without her consent. The only way would be if she was declared unfit to stand trial by a court-appointed psychiatrist. The standard for a defendant to be declared so mentally impaired that they're unable to stand trial is extremely high and she probably wouldn't measure up despite her delusions.
RoseVioletDaisy;
I'm afraid your information is in agreement with what I was already thinking. I could see a lot of people getting away with a lot of things if it were too easy to declare them incompentent. Because I had developed a certain sympathy for the character, I would have preferred to see her in a treatment enviroment rather than a punitive one. That final view of her, as she starts to transfer her delusions to the prison doc, seems to be just the next step in the wrong direction. An onlooker is just forced to accept the things one can not change.
Only the patient/convict can make the right changes, and she seemingly will not. Pity.
cmvgor
"A man does what he has to do-if he can't get out of it. - Bret Maverick's Pappy
Dear Green Eyed Female:
Can a woman sleep with a married man if she's married to him?!!
Just watched this movie for the first tonight. It was filmed in 2002 re an event that was written in a Vanity Fair Piece, September 1991. So, at that time, 1991, stalking was just beginning to get some attention. I wish I could read the original 1991 piece, but unfortunately, that issue doesn't pull up on Vanity Fair's website.
I wonder what happened to her? Was she let out of prison eventually? Really scary to believe someone could have this type of real emotional attachment to a person who isn't even giving them the time of day.
For a Lifetime movie, it was well done.
Shocked that the lawyer wouldn't have entered an insanity plea. She should have gone to a psychiatric facility. I wonder what happened when she got out of jail
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He never had any kind of relationship with her. It's not his fault that the woman was mentally ill. Geez.
Clark's destiny = Superman, Lex Luthor & Lois Lane.
I don't, she knows that what she has been doing was wrong but she did it anyways and she has never stopped.
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