COLUMN: MEDIA Analysis of Fatal Attraction and Gone Girl to Teach Personality Clusters Jake D. Hoyne 1 & Anthony Tobia 1 & Jessie Hanna 1 & Christine Annibali 1 & Rehan Aziz 1 Received: 14 August 2018 /Accepted: 20 November 2018 # Academic Psychiatry 2018 At Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School (RWJMS), PGY-1 and PGY-2 residents are taught psychopathology by reviewing various works in the horror genre through the cur- riculum known as Reviewing Mental Disorders through Reverent Understanding of the Macabre (REDRUM) [1]. The curriculum delineates multiple categories of mental dis- orders, each of which is highlighted by a fictional monster. For example, learners review a biographical account of the Romanian prince Vlad the Impaler to understand his ruthless- ness; he was known for frequently impaling his enemies on stakes and reportedly drank their blood [2]. This allows stu- dents to appreciate Vlad’ s influence on the creation of Bram Stoker ’ s Dracula (released in 1897), who is sustained on blood and can be only be killed by being impaled by a stake. Through more detailed character and plot analyses, Dracula comes to serve as a metaphorical case study of antisocial per- sonality disorder. Such discussions of both historical context and fictional symbolism allow for a rich and memorable les- son on a given aspect of psychopathology. Our course ex- pands from the “categorical monster” such as the vampire to include other films that demonstrate a more straightforward, albeit fictional, portrayal of mental disorders. One such film is the 1987 thriller Fatal Attraction [3] which serves as a case study of borderline personality disorder (BPD). This paper has two objectives. First, we will discuss Fatal Attraction’ s main antagonist, Alex Forest, as a fictional depic- tion of BPD. Second, we aim to demonstrate the creative aspect of REDRUM that teaches psychopathology and rein- forces critical thinking skills in our learners. We will achieve this by linking Fatal Attraction to a more contemporary film, Gone Girl [4] (2014), to review convergence of cluster B personality disorder nosology. This will involve reimagining parts of each movie’ s timeline in order to strengthen the edu- cational value of these vignettes. Course Description The syllabus for our REDRUM psychopathology course has been previously described [1]. For the personality disorders didactic, residents are encouraged to read the selected chapter from the required textbook, “Kaplan & Sadock’ s Synopsis of Psychiatry” [5]. The salient feature of the course is the sup- plementation of traditional classroom didactics with film viewings. The course is carefully designed to minimize the time commitment that would be required to watch movies outside of structured didactic time. As such, the course is scheduled for 2 h per week over the academic year. During a didactic session, the learners watch the selected film with the course director, who pauses the movie frequently for discus- sion of various segments. On average, a film didactic spans three sessions. Structuring the course in this manner ensures that the time requirement of watching movies does not limit their utility as a pedagogical resource. This paper highlights one of our sessions using the afore- mentioned films as fictional case studies of psychopathology. We will later hypothesize a connection between these two movies that further enhances the learner’ s understanding of the personality disorders. There is inherent difficulty in creat- ing curricula to teach the personality disorders, as there are numerous shortcomings of the current approach to these dis- orders. This controversy was addressed by the American Psychiatric Association (APA) when they published an alter- native model of the personality disorders in the “Emerging Measures and Models” section of the “Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition” (DSM-5) [6]. One limitation of the current practice is the overlap of diagnostic criteria; a patient meeting criteria for one personality disorder frequently also meets criteria for an- other personality disorder. By meeting our second objective, * Jake D. Hoyne Jdh191@rwjms.rutgers.edu 1 Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, New Brunswick, NJ, USA Academic Psychiatry https://doi.org/10.1007/s40596-018-1009-0