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Mind control in popular culture


Mind control has proven a popular subject in fiction, featuring in books and films such as The Manchurian Candidate (1959; film adaptation 1962) and The IPCRESS File (1962; film 1965), both stories advancing the premise that controllers could hypnotize a person into murdering on command while retaining no memory of the killing. As a narrative device, mind control serves as a convenient means of introducing changes in the behavior of characters, and is used as a device for raising tension and audience uncertainty in the contexts of Cold War and terrorism. Mind control has often been an important theme in science fiction and fantasy stories. Terry O'Brian comments: "Mind control is such a powerful image that if hypnotism did not exist, then something similar would have to have been invented: the plot device is too useful for any writer to ignore. The fear of mind control is equally as powerful an image."

The TV series The Prisoner featured mind control as a recurring plot element.

In the Korean mini-series Winter Sonata the protagonist has his memory altered by a clinical psychiatrist at his mother's request which forms the crux of the plot as he struggles to overcome it.

In the movie Conspiracy Theory, Mel Gibson plays Jerry Fletcher, a cab driver and a conspiracy theorist who accidentally hits a truth involving a secret government-funded mind control program, as it turns out Jerry himself is one of the subjects of the program.

In Judy Malloy's Revelations of Secret Surveillance, a group of artists and writers struggle to understand and expose a covert system that utilizes psychodrama and brain scanning surveillance to interfere with the lives of artists, activists, and many other people.

The novel Trilby (1894) features the character Svengali, who hypnotizes the novel's heroine to enhance her singing performance. The character gained popularity as the stereotype of an evil hypnotist, and became the basis for feature films throughout the 20th century.


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