May 33rd (2004 TV Movie) User Reviews

From a multiple...

[ncharleyz · 8/10 · 27 September 2005]

I remember watching this just after I was diagnosed and it was a good starting point for discussions with my T. I only managed to watch it once so I don't know specifics but my overall impression was that WOW that was a pretty good impression of what dissociation is like. I know there were points that annoyed me as being clichéd but overall I think it was good. Although it wasn't the same as what I experience it was close enough. People focus so much on the switching aspect of DID but I seem to remember this explained the sensory changes as well. For example laying on the floor not moving for hours, fascinated by textures etc. There is a scene, I appear to remember at the end of her walking down a street and her body posture and look seem right. The costume department did well in getting her dressed (clothes not matching because different people have bought them). She was good at describing the dysfunction of a multiple life. However I don't seem to remember much about the positivity and benefits of DID though I believe there was some humour. I was annoyed at the time because I was then functional. Now two years later, I'm not! I believe there was some allusion in the film to the fact that earlier in her life she had functioned in an outside life fully but then life had gone off the rails. Could be triggering to abuse survivors but different people are different by different things and I found it manageable.

Bleak, tense, documentary style drama, revealing the nature of DID

[the_unutterable · 7/10 · 28 September 2006]

First time I've been exposed to DID (similar to schizophrenia? Or have I got that wrong?) I was impressed by the actress playing Ella, as well as Sorrensen. The futility of her condition gave me the impression that this could have happened before and might happen again: She gains the trust of someone, and in turn learns to trust them in her attempt to break away from ritual abuse. However, in the end she drives a wedge between herself and her would-be rescuer through the fact that they simply cannot handle the excessive traits of her different personality fragments. She ends up back where she started, at the mercy of Barry and his cult, and so the cycle continues.

With regards to the cult, I thought it spoilt it slightly that they went into the detail they did. The effect was much better when it was simply alluded to, especially with Ellas reluctance to divulge information. The 'ceremony' seemed a bit to 70's horror schlock, cheesy if it is possible, given the bleak nature of the film.

Uncomfortable to sit through, but that was probably the aim of those that produced it.

Hypnotic, disturbing, brilliant

[Primadonna · 10/10 · 5 May 2004]

This extraordinary TV drama deserved more publicity and reviews. It is totally absorbing, beginning as the character attempts her escape from the life of abuse that is all she has known from childhood onwards.

This is the first drama I have ever seen about the phenomenon of dissociative identity disorder (DID), or multiple personality disorder. In the case of Ella Wilson, the character brilliantly played by Lia Williams, her mental problems stem from the cycle of brutal sexual abuse by a group of paedophiles, some of whom are relatives. When she visits an osteopath, Edward, his touch releases different personalities, and as he gradually understands the nature of the problem he intervenes to help her. But one of Ella's personalities is given to sudden acts of aggression, and Edward abruptly realizes his family may be at risk.

The immense problems suffered by a person with DID in finding anyone who will believe them, let alone help them, are agonizingly explored in this film. The acting, direction and camera work are superb, and Ella's repeated attempts at escaping from the cycle have a hypnotic effect. Not a happy film, but one to make you think for a long time afterwards.

a work of fiction presented as fact

[lou-131 · 1/10 · 23 October 2012]

I was astonished and shocked that the BBC presented this film as a dramatised documentary rather than a work of fiction.

The consultant for the film, Valerie Sinason, is a notorious psychotherapist who promotes the discredited belief that satanic cults are widespread and highly active in the UK. Sinason and her colleagues work work with mentally ill people and help them to "recover" memories of being abused by Satanists.

This drama follows the story of an alleged victim of such cults who suffers unimaginable abuses and indignities at the hands of apparently ordinary people who are in fact secret Satanists.

Despite the bizarre claims of Sinason and her colleagues and despite over 80 separate police investigations into allegations of satanic ritual abuse here in the UK not one scrap of corroborating evidence has ever been found.

The film is no more than a shabby piece of deranged propaganda aiming to generate panic and anxiety amongst the general public, who are invited to believe that Satanist are hiding behind the curtains of countless ordinary homes.

Definitely worth seeing as a fascinating example of propaganda, just please do not believe the underlying premise.