The Movie Manchurian Candidate - Term Paper Example

It is important to note that these dreams only intensified after the September 11 terror act which is many years after the event that caused their nightmares in the desert of the Gulf War. One of the protagonists, Shaw even already has a promising political career when he was just a mere Sergeant First Class when the traumatic event happen to demonstrate that times and circumstances have already lapsed.

Yet, despite the time and many events that had changed, Major Marco became extremely anxious displaying paranoia after the September 11 attack to the point that he even thought that there are enemies behind every bush ready to attack him or anybody.

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder: Description and Etiology
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) was used as anxiety ascribed to an anxiety disorder that is directly linked to wartime trauma. This disorder now however used to also include the psychological outcomes of a variety of traumatic events that include but are not limited to "miscarriage, life-threatening accidents (e.g., plane crash), sexual abuse and other criminal activity, and natural disasters (e.g., earthquake, tsunami)" (Jaffe and Schub, 2013 pg. 1). The American Psychological Association (APA) set the following criteria for them to be diagnosed with PTSD;

a. Witnessed at least once a life-threatening or traumatic event that could potentially harm and that the person responded with fear or helplessness.
b. Continue to experience such feelings of horror or helplessness through nightmares or flashbacks of the traumatic experience even if the threat is no longer present
c. Experiencing hyperarousal (i.e. active startle response) or in layman, what they call being paranoid.
d. Manifests insomnia, irritability, " numbing with mindful avoidance of all triggers (e.g., situations) that remind the person of the traumatic event; distress or social dysfunction in daily activities (e.g., work, school, social events); and persistence of all of the previous criteria for at least 1 month following the traumatic event "(Jaffe and Schub, 2013 pg. 1).
Rennison and Taylor also qualified a person with PTSD if he or she manifests the following symptoms
a. Reoccurring memories that cause distress;
b. Reoccurring dreams, fl washbacks, and a sense of reliving the event, all of which cause distress;
c. Intense discomfort and distress when exposed to stimuli that symbolize aspects of the event; and
d. Physical arousal is when exposed to cues that symbolize the event.
Symptom/s of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder manifested in the movie
The character who manifested the symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder was Major Bennet "Ben" Marco who had recurring dreams of what happened on his unit in the desert during the Gulf War. This symptom heightened after the September 11 terror attack which was many years after the Gulf War, when the actual event happened that haunted Major Marco. The nightmares and flashbacks escalated into paranoia that there are enemies behind every bush and that they could attack him at any moment. The other character who manifested the same symptom was Corporal Al Melvin who was raving about his dreams one of which was a tattooed woman whom he shared with Major Marco albeit his case was worst than Major Marco's.

The nightmares, flashbacks, and paranoia or hypervigilance that characters manifested were all obvious symptoms of PTSD. These nightmares, flashbacks, and paranoia heightened after the September 11 terror, many years after the Gulf War that Shaw, even became a Congressman while he was only a Sergeant First Class when the traumatic event happened. This is already a traumatic disorder because normally, certain bad experiences are forgotten with time but theirs re-occurred after a similar horrifying event albeit they are no longer the victim. This is a classic case of PSTD as reported by the study of Holowka et al who reported that war veterans still exhibit the symptom of trauma "More than 3 decades after the traumatic event, many treatment-seeking veterans of the Vietnam War continue to exhibit important symptoms of PTSD. Even those who never met or no longer met full diagnostic criteria continued to exhibit subthreshold or residual symptoms of PTSD, which have been linked to ongoing functional impairment" (Zlotnick, Franklin, & Zimmerman, 2002 quoted in Holowka et al., 2012 pg. 291).

One of the stark characteristics of PTSD is that it continues to manifest even after a long duration of time as the study of Holowka et al had reported and shown in the movie. Major Marco's seeming paranoia was a case of hypervigilance which Holowka et al described to be a dominant symptom of veterans having PTSD. Another notable symptom of paranoia/hypervigilance was that it became extremely keen after the September 11 terror attack which served as a cue that symbolized the traumatic event in the desert of the Gulf War which is consistent with the definition of Rennison and Taylor about PTSD (2013)
The tattooed woman in the dream may have been just a metaphorical addition to establish a link or to make it more obvious that Major Marco shares Corporal Melvin's PSTD whose case of PSTD was already acute and that it is a perpetual struggle that these men suffer for the rest of their lives.