Review of Hysteria (2011) by Dave R — 20 May 2012

Hysteria is not your typical button-up, corseted British costume drama. It is a dramedy billed as a romantic comedy about Victorian England doctor/inventor Mortimer Granville (Hugh Dancy - Confessions of a Shopaholic, Martha Marcy May Marlene) who is credited with inventing the therapeutic female pelvic massager! The film has a rather lewd-sounding storyline; but Hysteria never veers into the crass or crude and the invention of this device (Google it .

.. this was an actual COMMON medical condition in this era!) never really takes center stage. Granville does have many female patients he treats which we see and this all makes for some very awkward-viewing; but that is rather the point of the film.

This is supposed to be rather astounding to audiences ... which actually sets up the main focus of the story. Women were not respected and were mis-understood and the film's title, Hysteria, was a commonly diagnosed condition for women who spoke-out and disagreed with the male norm! That the film takes place in 1870's England is eye-opening as the film has some political relevance in 2012! The film's central female character, Charlotte (Maggie Gyllenhaal - Secretary, Crazy Heart), is a suffragist who believes in equal rights .

.. and she is threatened with the diagnosis of hysteria that could lead her to being institutionalized! If it wasn't a known fact that women have always been marginalized mis-understood by men-who-think-they-know-everything, I'd call this film unbelievably shocking; but sadly it isn't.

I know the ways of the world. Hysteria is a slight message movie but more than anything it is a British romp that is supposed to be enjoyed like other Brit films Kinky Boots, Waking Ned Devine or the Full Monty.

It is fun; but it is serious at the same time -- perhaps a "warning" should be issued for those easily offended by either sex or politics!