Nurse Ratched tells other nurses that McMurphy is just like previous patient Maxwell Taber. Chief explains how he once asked the nurse what kind of medication he was being given, and was subjected to electroshock therapy, and brain work that left him docile and unable to think. The Institution of insanity is foregrounded is a simple man asks a simple question and is subjected to inhuman treatment and torture.
It is only logical that a sane man will question such an system, but the act of questioning means his sanity will inevitably be compromised.
I feel like with the movie leaving out the Chief’s village does leave a hole in the story even though we read the book it would have been nice to see what Chief was in his past.
I think leave the Chief narrations out of the book really took away from the movie. In the book we get explanations of things that we don’t