History Film / SilverLiningsPlaybook

* SecondPlaceIsForWinners: Knowing that there is no way they could beat their more practiced competitors, Pat and Tiffany were only hoping for at least 5 out of 10 collective score to win TheBet. [[spoiler:They make it and the judges and their fellow competitors are wondering why they so happy at such a low score.]]

* EarnYourHappyEnding: Pat works hard to keep his mental health under control, have his parent's win a bet and find love and it works out in the end.

* AboveTheInfluence: Pat resists Tiffany's solicitations, because he is [[MadLove madly in love]] with Nikki.

* AssholeVictim: Possibly the man that was having an affair with Nikki. He even asks Pat to leave (his own house) after he catches them.
** The guy [[spoiler: Pat beats up at the Eagles game was one of a group who harasses and then assaults a group of Indian spectators (along with Pat's brother when he tries to stop them) is a straight example of this]].

* AxCrazy: It's best not to push the main characters' respective {{Berserk Button}}s.

** For Pat, it's hearing (or even imagining he's hearing) the Music/StevieWonder song "My Cherie Amour". It was his wedding song and then it was playing on the stereo when he caught his wife cheating on him.

* CallBack: The music Ronnie tells Pat is on the iPod he gives him ends up being used in Pat & Tiffany's dance routine.

* CowardiceCallout: Tiffany basically tells Pat that he's a coward and is afraid to be alive, because of how he's happy to hear about her intense life story but unwilling to live through anything like it.
* CrazyJealousGuy[=\=]MadLove: Pat regarding Nikki.

* EasilyForgiven: Nobody ever really speaks badly about Nikki, despite her having an affair in her husband's house to their wedding song, henceforth traumatizing him. To be fair, it is all overshadowed by Pat's savage beating of her lover along with the restraining order.
** Also, while nobody speaks badly about her, nobody really speaks well about her besides Pat. Their main concern is trying to keep Pat away from Nikki. This could be because of the restraining order or because they think that what she did was wrong and she's not right for him anymore.
** This is in definite contrast to the novel, where nearly everyone who knows Pat speaks badly about Nikki. [[spoiler:In fact, Pat's parents file a counter restraining order against her. Then again, Nikki is portrayed in a far less charitable light: not only does she cheat, but she also knocks Pat out in the incident that broke them up, and then takes his assets, their bank accounts, and their house in the divorce. Doubles as a KarmaHoudini, since she marries the man she cheated with, has kids with him, still resides in their old home, and seems to have lived a perfectly happy life while Pat has been institutionalized for ''four years.'']]

* FreakOut: A few times, most notably when Pat first catches his wife cheating and nearly beats her lover to death in a blind rage and [[spoiler: when he can't find his wedding video.]]

* HappilyMarried: Tiffany and her husband for the first couple of years. By the third it had gone stale. [[spoiler: In an effort to spice up their marriage he buys her some lingerie. On the way home he helps someone with car trouble and gets struck and killed by another car.]]

** There's actually been debate among psychologists over which illnesses Pat and Tiffany have. The consensus seems to be that Tiffany shows strong signs of Borderline Personality Disorder, while there's some dispute over whether Pat really has bipolar.

* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Pat's older brother, who comes off as a smug {{Jerkass}} in his first scene but spends the movie's final act wholeheartedly supporting Pat.
** Also played with a bit - he admits that he has no idea how to deal with Pat's situation when contrasted with how well he is doing himself.
** JerkassRealization: All he really wants to do is catch Pat up on how his life is going. You can tell that around the middle of the conversation Jake starts to realize that it sounds like he's rubbing it in.
** Tiffany is definitely this.

* NeverTrustATrailer: The first full trailer for the film featured Pat's line "I'm my best self today, and I think she's her best self too," presented in a way that implies he's referring to Tiffany; in context, he's referring to Nikki.

* NiceGuy: Pat, despite saying tactless things and freaking out due to his bipolar disorder, is this. He never does any of the aforementioned acts out of malice and is generally a friendly and caring guy who loves and looks out for his friends and family.

%%* OnlySaneMan: Pat's mother Dolores and Dr. Patel.

* ProperlyParanoid: To some extent; Pat relates an incident where he tried to report his wife and a history teacher at the school they worked at for conspiring against him, which he later recognizes correctly as a delusion. However, he learns barely a week later that they are in fact having an affair.

* RememberTheNewGuy: It seems odd that Pat had never met Tiffany before, with him and Nikki being friends with her sister and her sister's husband. It's implied that she and Tommy still lived in Philadelphia, as the officer that is assigned to enforce Pat's restraining order remembers Tommy, meaning he served in Philadelphia.
** He does know her name before Ronnie mentions it, so maybe they just weren't well acquainted?

* ShipperOnDeck: Pat's mother. Tiffany's mother seems to lean toward it later in the film. Ultimately Pat's father.
** Ronnie and Veronica probably before everyone. They were likely trying to set the two up.

** Avoided, when Pat realizes who the letter was written by.
* ThrowTheBookAtThem: Though not at someone, Pat chucks ''Literature/AFarewellToArms'' [[ApplianceDefenestration out his bedroom window]] upon finishing it. And throws a fit at its DownerEnding.

* VagueAge: Tiffany is at least 21, but she was also married to her cop husband for 3 years before he died. Lampshaded when Pat asks how old she is after she propositions him for sex.
** This is likely because Tiffany was intended to be much older than Jennifer Lawrence. Creator/AnneHathaway was [[WhatCouldHaveBeen originally cast]] in the part, and Lawrence stated that there was some initial concern between her and director David O. Russell that she would be too young (she was 21 when filming started). This may be why Tiffany's age is left ambiguous, so as to not look ridiculous if she was in her late 20s or even early 30s.

* AnythingThatMoves: The reason Tiffany got fired from her job: she slept with everyone in her office, including women.

* ReallyGetsAround: From Tiffany's own words, "I was a slut. There will always be a part of me that is dirty and sloppy, but I like that, just like all the other parts of myself." (see also AnythingThatMoves, above)

* BareYourMidriff: Tiffany during the final dance sequence.

* ReluctantPsycho: Pat's story arc is about coming to terms with the fact that he's one of these. The Psycho part of it becomes frighteningly apparent on the night he starts searching the house for his wedding video. [[spoiler: He freaks out because he can't find it, wakes up everyone in the neighborhood with his shouting, hits his own mother in the face (albeit accidentally) when she tries to restrain him and then gets into a fistfight with his own father.]]

* WidowWoman: Tiffany, whose husband has died.

* {{Gainaxing}}: When Danny drops by to see Pat and Tiffany's dance practice, he sees Tiffany bouncing in every way, intervenes, and makes her bounce even more!

* CryCute: Tiffany does this numerous times.

* BirdsOfAFeather: Pat and Tiffany initially bond over their mutual neuroses, recently single status (he's divorced, she's widowed) and interest in running.

** Also, [[spoiler: assaulting Pat's brother is nowhere near to being a good idea.]] Those fools had a chance of avoiding his wrath until they made that one mistake.

*** Also, don't hit his wife, even if it's an accident. Really, don't.

* NotSoDifferent:
** [[InvokedTrope Invoked]] by Pat as his father drives him to an Eagles game, as he points out that his father's been banned from the stadium for getting in fights.
** Pat lets it slip that he thinks Tiffany is crazier than him. She vehemently disagrees, and he comes to agree with her as well.

* RealityEnsues: Pat beating the crap out of his wife's lover gets him arrested, sent to a mental hospital, having to attend mandatory therapy as a condition of his release, and with a restraining order against him. While his wife and her lover's actions are never made out to be "right", it's made clear that his violent reaction isn't either.

* SoftGlass: Honestly Pat Sr, when You buy window glass so cheap that a paperback novel is like a brick when thrown at it, You have only yourself to blame.

* SoftGlass: Honestly Pat Sr, when You buy window glass so cheap that a paperback novel is like a brick when thrown at it, You have only Yourself to blame.

* SecondPlaceIsForWinners: Knowing that there is no way they could beat their more practiced competitors, Pat and Tiffany were only hoping for at least 5 out of 10 collective score to win TheBet. [[spoiler:They make it and their competitors and judges are wondering why they so happy at such a low score.]]

* ReluctantPsycho: Pat's story arc is about coming to terms with the fact that he's one of these. The Psycho part of it becomes frighteningly apparent on the night he starts searching the house for his wedding video. [[spoiler: He freaks out because he can't find it, wakes up everyone in the neighborhood with his shouting, punches his own mother in the face when she tries to restrain him and then gets into a fistfight with his own father.]]
* RememberTheNewGuy: It seems odd that Pat had never met Tiffany before, with him and Nikki being friends with her sister and her sister's husband. It's implied that she and Tommy still lived in Philadelphia, as the officer that is assigned to enforce Pat's restraining order remembers Tommy, meaning he served in Philadelphia.
** He does know her name before Ronnie mentions it, so maybe they just weren't well acquainted?