Side Effects
The beautiful life of Emily (Rooney Mara) and Martin (Channing Tatum), a New York couple, falls apart when Martin is imprisoned on insider trading charges. He serves his sentence, while she waits for him for four long years.
But the long-awaited return of her husband does not revive Emily; instead, it drives her into an ever-deepening depression, leading her to the extreme attempt of taking her own life.
Psychiatrist Jonathan Banks (Jude Law) takes on her case. A new psychotropic drug initially seems to lift her mood, but soon the side effects wreak havoc on the lives of Emily, Martin, and Dr. Banks.
The side effects are not always those caused by a drug, but rather those caused by a long separation. Caused by the abrupt change in the protagonist’s lifestyle, her social status.
What will trigger in her mind? How far will she go to regain what she has lost?
This time, Soderbergh delves into the psychological thriller. In the first part of the film, there is a strong sense of witnessing a critique against pharmaceutical companies. A cry for attention to the increasingly invasive presence of medications, especially psychotropic drugs.
“Chemistry helps you live,” declares Dr. Banks.
In the second part, the tone shifts dramatically toward thriller territory, the pace changes, and we find ourselves facing something unexpected.
Everything we took for granted in the end isn’t quite so…
I’d like to highlight the beautiful soundtrack by Thomas Newman, a sort of lullaby teetering between madness and sanity, much like the film itself…
Screenwriter Scott Z. Burns was inspired by real events related to the pharmaceutical industry and controversies surrounding antidepressant drugs. The plot explores the side effects of these drugs in a disturbing and surprising way.
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