Film is a type of media, which frames information into a genre conditioned story with vividly visualized characters, which allow viewers to identify with them or to distance themselves easily. Movies, just like other types of media, construct reality and fill the heads of consumers with different opinions, propositions and images. The creators express their ideas trough different techniques, which allow identification and distance creation (the two mentioned relationships between film characters and viewers) to happen. We will focus on one of the techniques that, by touching on various controversies, opens taboo discourses between people – representation. By using the method analysis of representation, we will explore the taboo of mental illness in contemporary Hollywood movies. Until recently, movies have represented mental illnesses in common ways, which can be put into types. Some of these types are also stereotypes. We will define these common types of representation, stereotypes and stigma that comes with them. Our goal will be to classify some modern film examples into these types and try to define possible new ones.
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