Joy, Sadness, Fear, Anger, Disgust.
Emotions drive individuals to react to situations differently. What excites one person might make another nervous.
“Inside Out” discusses the theme of what really goes on inside someone’s head and what controls their responses to different situations in their life. Viewers experience this ride through the eyes of a little girl named Riley and the emotions that live in the headquarters of, well, her head.
Active Minds held a screening of the new Disney animation on April 6th in Widener Lecture Hall.
“Active Minds decided to hold this event in order to promote mental health in a fun, relaxing environment and also in order to play our part for Unity Week 2016,” Active Minds president Amber McVaugh said.
“The movie connects to mental health in a variety of ways,” she said. “Most notably, the emotions portrayed are real and relatable. We’re naturally programmed to try to live for joyous moments in order to make the best memories. The movie teaches us that sometimes it’s all emotions that make us human. Depression is real and, at times, it’s uncontrollable.”
In the movie Riley’s family moves from Minnesota to San Francisco. Her “core memories” that make up her personality accidentally get removed from headquarters along with Joy and Sadness. It is up to these two to bring the memories back to their rightful place.
But since they are not inside the control center Riley cannot experience Joy and her personality starts to fall apart and she becomes depressed.
“It shows the emotions that everyone has going on. I personally could relate to Fear because I have anxiety towards everything,” sophomore accounting and marketing major Alexis Schwarz said.
“I chose to go to the event to support a friend who was running it,” sophomore graphic design major Anthony Cirillo said. “It was a fun time to be able to be with my friends and watch a movie I had not seen yet. I really liked the movie.”
“The movie used a lot of the same terminology [that deals with mental illness] but it was done in a way that kids, adults and adolescents can understand. You understand your brain more than before,” sophomore early and special education major Sabrina Lee said.
“I never watched the movie so I was really excited to watch it. My favorite actress is the voice of Disgust,” senior criminology and sociology major Nazifa Akanda said. “It was interesting for me to watch because, obviously its fictional, but it was cool how Anger and Joy and Sadness all came together to create special memories for us.”
After the movie ended those in attendance discussed how they felt about Joy and Sadness.
“I hope people realized that sadness is nothing to be ashamed of. A lot of times, we try to hide behind this facade of joy,” McVaugh said. “Sometimes a little dose of sadness makes us stronger in the end, and gives us more of a drive to go on.”
