MovieChat Forums > One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975) Discussion > Nurse Ratched - over rated in the 'evil'...

Nurse Ratched - over rated in the 'evil' department

posted 9 years ago by Don_Falone1985
10 replies | jump to latest

I have always wondered why so many people describe nurse Ratched as " one of the best movie villains " and " nurse Ratched is so evil" ... Now I have seen this film many times and I love it but I could never get me head around people claiming she's horrible. Don't get me wrong she's a cold hearted and stoney faced character but please tell me what she actually did that would be considered "evil"? She never mis treated patients physically although you could say emotionally she got to Billy when she threatened to tell his mum which caused him to slash his wrists. How was she to know he was going to find a sharp object and do this? She was a cold character but in no way, shape or form was she evil. I find her " evilness" a little overrated.

[–] ck1-5 9 years ago

Honestly, I'd rate what she did to Billy at the end right up there with torturing puppies and kittens. To take someone who is that fragile and threaten them with the very thing that they most fear...what does she do on her days off? Throw children who cant swim into the river?

[–] The_White_Hotel 9 years ago

The worst thing about Ratched is that she doesn't recognise her own villainy. Her character is an analogy for a kind of clinical officiousness that thrives at the expense of humanity. The film is kind of about how the world finds ways of getting you down that are not conscious but come about as a result of skewed priorities.

[–] cartesianthought 9 years ago

Yes, I think the hypocrisy is what people hate about her the most.

McMurphy was selfish, sociopathic and destructive (every bit as much as the nurse), but he never claimed himself to be a hero.

But for Ratched to abuser her power in the position she was in makes her not only a villain, but a hypocrite too.

[–] cheedo 8 years ago

No, but the book and movie do that for him. You're supposed to see him as the hero and victim even when he genuinely is in the wrong.

Is he gonna borrow a cup o' sugar from Satan?

[–] 8 years ago

[deleted]

[–] Freddyfan951 8 years ago

In the film, it could be interpreted that she was just doing her job like any nurse at time would do.
In the book, it's much more obvious how calculating and sadistic she is. Letting orderlies rape patents to make them easier to control was pretty evil. And when Billy died, she went to McMurpyh and basically said "Look what you made him do!" she didn't care at all, just using Billy's death to get back at him.

They didn't capture it as well in the film. I think part of why people who've never read the book hate her is because she's such a convincing authority figure, that you project your memories of people like that into her character.

[–] CoSMiGoNoN 8 years ago

I don't know about the novel, but in the movie she was just doing her job.

[–] GreenGoblinsOckVenom86 8 years ago

I am just gonna use the first group session as proof that she is evil. She puts Harding on the spot and then lets everyone yell at the top of their lungs at him. How does this help anyone? Well it doesn't. That's the point. She doesn't want to help anyone. She doesn't want any of her patients out of the institution. That is the point.

Green Goblin is great! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1L4ZuaVvaw

[–] akenworthy87 8 years ago

The way she kept changing the goal posts on the vote for putting the ball game on TV showed she was a dishonest controlling cow too.

[–] parvati_patil_mm24 8 years ago

I only watched this movie last week, after years of finding Nurse Ratched in all sorts of lists of villains and I thought the same thing. I haven't read the book, all I knew about her were what I had read on articles on the Internet and judging by that, I expected her to be a monster. She didn't give me that impression. She was cold, yes. But I wasn't even convinced that she didn't care about her patients. It seemed to me like she was just trying to do her job, being strictly professional. The only point where I think she acted deliberately evil was with McMurphy, and although in no way do I justify the lobotomy she decided to do on him, you can't deny that he went out of his way to cause trouble to her.
To sum up, yes, I find her characterisation as an evil character (at least as she is presented in the movie) a bit exaggerated.