Cake: A story of chronic pain, depression, & grief
The movie opens on a chronic pain support group where Claire gives her opinion on the suicide of a fellow group member, Nina, congratulating her on her choice. Claire is then asked to leave the support group because of her “anger issues”. She suffers through physical therapy where she is “fired” due to lack of improvement (something I’m familiar with).
It’s clear that Claire is truly suffering but it’s not immediately apparent from what. Obviously, chronic pain is a huge part of it you can see that in her movement and that would certainly be enough. But, as those of us who live with chronic pain know, pain doesn’t not come alone, it often brings friends. And Claire is no stranger to these friends – grief, depression, anger, and in her case addiction.
Movie Review: Cake starring Jennifer Aniston Share on XAniston’s character is living with chronic pain following a car accident that scarred her face, left her with pins in her leg and most importantly, took her son’s life. Unfortunately, this last pain is one that the pain pills don’t really help. She medicates her pain with pain pills (some legal and some not so) and alcohol.
Addiction rules Claire’s life. She lies to the chronic pain clinic to get more meds, then when she uses all of those she has her maid, Sylvana, drive her to Tijuana to get more. Claire’s layers really shine during this trip when her maid runs into some bitchy old friends who evidently don’t know that she’s a maid. Instead Claire pretends that she’s the maid, giving Sylvana a nice boost.
Claire deals with her own depression and questions her own life, even considering suicide. She begins to retrace Nina’s steps, visiting her home and meeting her husband, Roy. She develops a sort of friendship with Roy as she continues to try to learn more about Nina’s suicide. She manipulates him so that she doesn’t have to be alone, stealing pain pills from his medicine chest. As her relationship with Roy and his son develops, she begins to face the grief of losing her own son. After she almost over-doses on pain pills she finally decides she’s had enough and is ready to try life without the drugs. Throughout all of this, Claire is regularly visited by Nina’s “ghost,” played by Anna Kendrick, calling her out on her issues.
Jennifer Aniston’s portrayal of chronic pain
Aniston’s visual portrayal of chronic pain is dead-on from the way she climbs out from the backseat of the taxi that brings her home after the support group meeting, to the way she wakes up in the middle of the night in agony. Aniston does an excellent job of moving, talking, and acting as if she is chronic pain. Her movements are slow, measured, and limited. She’s obviously spent a lot of time with someone who really suffers from chronic pain.
Additionally, she wears no make-up in the movie aiding her in “looking sick.” I couldn’t find any info to confirm it but it looked like she may have also gained a few pounds to make the movie. She still looked great, but she certainly didn’t look the beautiful and perfect Jennifer Aniston we see in every other role she’s portrayed.
At one point Roy mentions leaving his own grief support group because there’s too much anger. Claire’s response was that anger feels good. I get both of these statements. I’ve seen the anger in support groups both online and in person. Negativity is probably the number one reason I’ve seen people report they no longer attend support groups. And, yet I get that it feels good, too. These two statements show people in two different places with their own grief. Roy is ready to move on from his grief. Claire is not yet ready to let go of her anger. I think we all start off that way, start off with anger feeling good, only to eventually find that we have to let go of it and move on. Maybe that’s the real point of support groups to give us what we need as we need it. A place to safely vent our anger when we aren’t ready to let go, but a place to help us acknowledge that the anger has served its purpose when it’s really time to move on.
Overall, I thought Cake was an excellent movie and Jennifer Aniston’s portrayal of chronic pain in the movie was spot on. What I didn’t like about the movie was that the aspect of chronic pain was down-played and the addiction was upped. This could easily mislead people (especially those already prone to believe it) that all people with chronic pain are pill-seeking addicts. Aniston’s character was in a lot of pain, some that meds could help, others that meds would never touch and I think that’s true for all of us.
This movie is truely a Cake of many layers, it’s not just about chronic pain, nor is it just about grief, nor just about addiction. It’s about all of those things, but it’s also about love and friendship, and forgiveness. If you’ve not seen it yet, you can check it out Netflix or Amazon.
Syn says
Thank you, this was a good find. I think the film did a great job capturing the relationship between physical and emotional pain, and the isolation that accompanies both.
Donna says
I agree with all you have written. I think Jennifer did a great job and like you say, all her movements etc were spot on. I saw in an interview that she was terrified of being left in pain because she actually began to feel sore from the way she had to hold her body. I believe she had regular body work to keep her healthy.
Julie says
Kind of adds to the idea that letting ourselves get wrapped up in our pain only makes us feel worse. Also, that a lot of our pain is worsened because of the muscle tension and poor posture.