Review of Hysteria (2011) by Byron B — 22 Aug 2012

I worked backstage on the stage play In the Next Room (or The Vibrator Play) by Sarah Ruehl in Cleveland in the spring of 2012. I heard this movie (with the same general plot themes) was being released around the same time.

The play is a few years old and evidently is not the source of the movie's script. Both are about the invention of the vibrator to treat hysteria in women in the Victorian Age. Both contain lots of laughs, mainly from the way this subject still makes society blush.

In fact, it is only on the surface that these two stories are similar. The characters and actions that make up the movie are distinct in themselves. The costumes and set decorations are well done. The early electrical contraptions that Everett's character tinkers with really give us the feeling of traveling back in time.

Gyllenhaal's Charlotte Dalrymple is a proto-feminist and social reforming school teacher. The way that she and Dancy's Granville end up romantically entangled is pretty standard. Both of their characters seem more like 21st Century creations thrust into this late-19th Century world.

Even though the romance is nothing special, the comedy is worth your time. Sit back, loosen up, and feel the tension melt away.