Patch Adams Essay

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The movie “Patch Adams” which was directed by Tom Shadyac, was based on a true story about a medical student who believes that a great amount of suffering can be relieved through laughter. The movie begins showing Hunter “Patch” Adams in a mental hospital seeking help for his suicidal depression. Patch discovers that he can help people with out the use of medicine and learns different ways to look at life with the help of other patients in the hospital. Patients like Rudy, who Patch helps to overcome his fears of imaginary squirrels so he can go to the bathroom and learns from an old man that four fingers really becomes eight when he “looks beyond the fingers, and sees what others don’t see.” He finds what he was meant to do with his life. He leaves the institution and enters medical school, determined to graduate and start helping people as soon as possible. But this eager student can’t wait till he graduates to start helping people, he wants to help anyone and everyone he can as soon as possible. Therefore, he decides to break rules and enter the hospital looking for patients in a need for a laugh when he comes upon a room full of kids undergoing chemotherapy. He sees no smiles among the small children so he decides to walk in and put on a clown show to make the kids laugh and brighten up their boring days in their hospital beds. Though Patch knew he was doing wrong and visiting places he was not suppose to visit he decides to continue to bring company and laughs to the all of the patients in the hospital, young and old. After he gets in trouble several times with one professor in particular he decides to open up his own medical place while he continues to try and graduate college. In the end, with a few major bumps along the way, Patch manages to help many people and ends up graduating at the top of his class earning a PHD. James-Lange view of emotion was proven

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