"The Voorman Problem" Analysis

“In this country there’s very little difference between the prison and the asylum”

I found this quote to be interesting, in general but also more specifically in the context of this movie. Insanity versus reality was a major theme of the film, and it made me wonder what exactly qualifies a person as insane. Sure, there are guidelines to be followed that help determine this, but if someone else begins believing the insane person, does that make them insane as well? In “The Voorman Problem” this was basically what happened. Once the doctor realized that the inmate could actually have some of the power that he claimed to have, he became the “insane” one. After a while, it seems like it would be impossible to tell who was insane and who wasn’t in that prison, with everyone believing that one of their own was a god. However, he did seem to prove his case, so would everyone believing him be insane or just logical?  In this way, insanity is a prison within itself: there is no way to fight one’s way out of it once immersed in it or being labeled as so. This is actually a scary thought; while what happened in the film would most likely never play out, the idea of insanity versus reality is definitely a sensitive one and being involved in such a situation would involve treading lightly. The prison in this case would be a person’s own head.
This quote leads the audience to ponder the reality of the difference between prisons and asylums. In my opinion, being trapped within one’s own mind is even worse than physically being incarcerated, and the men in this film both get to experience a bit of each. However, being trapped in an asylum is arguably worse than being incarcerated because, as I said earlier, there may never be a way out. People have a way of claiming insanity through practically any action of a person once they are considered insane, which is portrayed very well by the end of the film. The main character, the doctor, does seem like the insane one at the end, yelling and protesting. It made me as a viewer wonder whether he even was the sane one by that point. This film was definitely worth watching and made me wonder about insanity versus reality in people.