Hey, want to watch a movie based on a psychiatric study? Maybe not under normal circumstances, but the trailer for Three Christs may change your mind. The film is based on the controversial 1964 book by psychologist Milton Rokeach, and his treatment of three schizophrenics who each believe they are Jesus Christ. How does a movie with Peter Dinklage, Walton Goggins, and Bradley Whitford suffering from delusions of grandeur sound? Sounds like fun to me.
Richard Gere leads as the doctor looking to make a breakthrough with his patients, without the use of electroshock therapy as was popular at the time. The film marks the return of Fried Green Tomatoes director Jon Avnet, his first since 2008’s Righteous Kill.
Debuting more than two years ago at TIFF, the reviews haven’t been glowing and that probably explains the long wait. Then again, the cast and the subject are worth taking a chance on, if you ask me.
SYNOPSIS: In 1959, psychiatrist Dr. Alan Stone (Richard Gere) arrives at a mental hospital in Ypsilanti, Michigan armed with the radical belief that schizophrenic patients should be treated not with confinement and electroshock therapy but with empathy and understanding. As his first study, he takes on the particularly challenging case of three men—Joseph (Peter Dinklage), Leon (Walton Goggins), and Clyde (Bradley Whitford)—each of whom believes they are Jesus Christ. Hoping that by getting them together in the same room to confront their delusions he can break through to them, Dr. Stone begins a risky, unprecedented experiment that will push the boundaries of psychiatric medicine and leave everyone involved—including Dr. Stone himself—profoundly changed. Based on a remarkable true story, Three Christs is a fascinating and moving look at one man’s journey into the deepest mysteries of the human mind.
Also starring Julianna Margulies, Stephen Root, and Kevin Pollak, Three Christs hits theaters and digital on January 24th 2020.
