25+ Great Movies About Life After a Nervous Breakdown

Everyone from con artists to business executives to former musicians have suffered an onscreen nervous breakdown. The top mental break movies feature characters dealing with anger issues, personal baggage, and depression. This is a list of mental hospital movies featuring everything from Silver Linings Playbook to Welcome to Me to A Streetcar Named Desire.

What movies will you find on this list of the best flicks about life after a nervous breakdown? One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is an enduring classic of the genre. Randle McMurphy (Jack Nicholson) enters a mental institution to avoid a tough jail sentence, but his sanity is pushed to the limits by the domineering staff. American Beauty is another great movie that features several characters at different stages of mental breakdowns. The newer hit Greenberg follows a middle-aged man re-entering the world after spending some time in a mental hospital. Other good films featured on this roundup of the top nervous breakdown movies include Secretary, Black Swan, and Stay.

Do you have a favorite mental illness movie? Give the best films a thumbs up and please add any good movies that are missing.