10. As Good As It Gets (1997)

Jack Nicholson is known for playing the role of the madman in many different movies. Mostly he plays the part of the psychotic character; but in the movie we’re talking about, 'As Good As It Gets', he manages to realistically play the role of an obsessive-compulsive person. The movie is a good example of a romantic comedy: the comedic side is aided by the great and hilarious interpretation of Nicholson, who plays the misanthropic novelist Melvin. 

9. Girl, Interrupted (1999)

Adapted from the eponymous memoir of Susanna Kaysen, 'Girl, Interrupted' well manages to describe the rhythms and medical procedures of a typical mental institution of the 60s, focusing in particular on the relationships between nurses and patients. The story is told from the perspective of the female protagonist, Susanna, played by Winona Ryder, a depressed young woman who, after a failed suicide attempt, is forced by her parents to check herself in a psychiatric hospital. She befriends the charismatic and chaotic Lisa, played by Angelina Jolie, awarded with an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress. Lisa manifests all the main symptoms, like the failure to conform to social norms and laws, impulsivity, tendency to being aggressive, and lack of remorse, all of which are well portrayed in the movie.

8. Analyze This (1999)

Harold Ramis is the mind behind one of the best mafia comedies ever made. Starring two great actors with great comedic potential, Robert De Niro and Billy Crystal, 'Analyze This' is a hilarious comedy that manages to entertain by mixing the stereotypical lifestyle of an Italo-American mafia boss with the world of psychiatry. Robert De Niro plays Paul Vitti, a powerful boss of Italian organized crime in the New York area. One day he decides to visit a psychiatrist, Ben Sobel, played by Billy Crystal. The movie focuses a lot on the link between doctor and patient, creating hilarious situations built around the fact that Sobel doesn’t know how to deal with such an important figure of organized crime, a strong-willed man who first asks him for help, then refuses to accept he is suffering from panic attacks.

7. Hollywood Ending (2002)

Those familiar with Woody Allen’s filmography and biography know how much psychology matters for him; a lot of his movies include references to psychoanalysis and feature mentally problematic characters. Woody Alle's character,Waxman, shows the symptoms of a conversion disorder, an uncommon mental disorder that affects voluntary motor or sensory functions, therefore suggesting at first sight the occurring of some general medical condition, whose nature is often thought to be neurological, while the true causing factors are psychological.

6. Spider (2002)

David Cronenberg is known for his weird body-horror movies and a peculiar taste both for the mutations of the human flesh and disorders of the brain. Delusional characters are a common presence in his movies as well, but the one that truly represents a plausible mentally ill person is the psychotic protagonist of 'Spider', a movie adapted from a novel by Patrick McGrath, a psychiatrist turned novelist. Ralph Fiennes plays Dennis Cleg, a man in a semi-catatonic state who is discharged from a mental hospital and sent to live in a private house together with other psychiatric patients. Cleg manifests delusions and the symptoms of disorganized speech and behavior, consistent with what psychiatric science define as schizophrenia spectrum disorder.

5. Margot at the Wedding (2007)

Noah Baumbach is an independent director with a preference for dramatic comedies. 'Margot at the Wedding' is no exception and gives a good example of Baumbach’s style; he likes essential plots that allow him to concentrate the attention on the personalities of his characters. His movies don’t feature a lot of action but are more focused on smart dialogues, which make these simple stories interesting and make us feel for their protagonists. Margot, a successful writer played by Nicole Kidman, is suffering from BPD, so her moody behavior and her frequent sudden moments of anger gives us a good portrayal of a borderline personality disorder patient.

4. Helen (2009)

This is probably the movie that more than any other on this list could be defined medically accurate. Its depiction of a patient suffering from major depressive disorder is so strikingly realistic that it could even be used for didactic purposes, as it perfectly shows a typical manifestation of this severe mood disorder, along with its clinical course and options of treatment. The protagonist is Helen, played by Ashley Judd, a successful professor of music who is divorced but is leading a seemingly happy life along with her new husband and daughter. That is, until something breaks inside her mind; she begins to lose concentration during lessons and has frequent moments of intense, unjustified sadness, so strong that it starts to alarm her and her husband.

3. Antichrist (2009)

Lars von Trier’s cryptic picture about a woman struggling to live through the death of her child was one of the most discussed movie of 2009. It stars only two main characters, a woman and her husband, respectively played by Charlotte Gainsbourg and Willem Dafoe. The sorrowful tone of the film reflects the director’s own state of mind while filming; von Trier has stated that he started to make the film after he suffered from depression for a long period. Moreover, the movie itself is the first part of what is known as his 'Depression trilogy', followed by 'Melancholia' and 'Nymphomaniac'.

2. Kotoko (2011)

Shinya Tsukamoto is the Japanese cult director who likes to focus the movies around individuals who fall into a state of ecstatic madness, that is likely induced by the dehumanizing atmosphere of the contemporary metropolis. Included in this group of mentally unstable characters is also the protagonist of one of Tsukamoto’s last works, 'Kotoko'. Kotoko is the name of a young mother who is apparently dealing with a serious mental condition, in constant fear of hurting her own infant son; she suffers from a kind of double vision that makes her delusional. But her psychotic behavior, which includes self-harm, is involuntarily a good representation of how a true paranoid schizophrenic behaves; she manifests characteristic symptoms like delusions, an antisocial attitude, a lack of motivation, and seldom catatonic-like states.

1. Still Alice (2014)

Julianne Moore’s interpretation of Alice, a professor affected with Alzheimer’s disease is one of the most convincing representations of this mental disorder we can see in movies. 'Still Alice' focuses in particular on how the degenerative nature of this illness strikes both the patient and her family, friends and colleagues. Julianne Moore’s dramatic interpretation realistically portrays all the main symptoms along with their worsening: memory impairment, aphasia, agnosia, and disturbance in executive functioning. Moore was awarded with an Oscar for Best Actress in 2015.