Patch Adams - (Robin Williams)

Patch Adams is a 1998 American comedy-drama film directed by Tom Shadyac, written by Steve Oedekerk, and starring Robin Williams in the title role, Monica Potter, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Bob Gunton, Daniel London and Peter Coyote. Set in the late 1960s and early 1970s, it is loosely based on the life story of medical doctor Hunter "Patch" Adams and the book Gesundheit: Good Health Is a Laughing Matter by Adams and Maureen Mylander.

In 1969, Hunter "Patch" Adams, after developing suicidal thoughts, admits himself to a mental institution. There, he finds that using humor, rather than doctor-centered psychotherapy, better helps his fellow patients and provides him with a new purpose. Because of this, he wants to become a medical doctor and leaves the facility. Two years later, he enrolls at the Medical College of Virginia as its oldest first-year student.

Adams questions the school's soulless approach to medical care, particularly why students do not work with patients until their third year, as well as the methods of the school's dean, Walcott, who takes an instant disliking to him. Adams is expelled from the medical school but is reinstated when it becomes apparent that his eccentric methods often improve his patients' physical and mental health.

He begins a friendship with fellow student Carin Fisher and develops his idea for a medical clinic built around his philosophy of treating patients using humor and compassion. With the help of Arthur Mendelson, a wealthy man who was a patient with Adams while in the mental hospital, he purchases 105 acres (42 hectares) in West Virginia to construct the future Gesundheit! Institute. When the clinic opens, they treat patients without medical insurance and perform comedy sketches for them.

Adams's friendship with Fisher turns into romance. When she reveals that she had been molested as a child, he reassures her that she can overcome her pain by helping others. Encouraged, Fisher wants to help a disturbed patient, Lawrence "Larry" Silver. However, Silver murders Fisher with a shotgun and then kills himself in a murder-suicide. Adams, guilt-ridden, questions the goodness in humanity. Standing on a cliff, he contemplates suicide again and asks God for an explanation. He sees a butterfly, and it reminds him that Fisher had always wished that she were a caterpillar that could turn into a butterfly and fly away. With his spirits revived, he decides to dedicate his work to her memory.

Walcott discovers that Adams has been illegally running a clinic and practicing medicine without a license and attempts to expel him again. Adams files a grievance with the state medical board and convinces them that he must treat the spirit as well as the body. The board, although still finding some of Adams's methods very eccentric and unorthodox, allows him to graduate, and he receives a standing ovation from the packed hearing room.

At graduation, Adams receives his Doctor of Medicine degree and, bowing to the professors and audience, reveals himself to be naked underneath his cap and gown.