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Characters On The Couch

How a psychologist thinks about your favorite Film & TV characters.

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The Favourite How Envy Plays A Part In Sexual Favors To A Queen

THE FAVOURITE
How Envy Plays Its Part
In Sexual Favors To A Queen?

January 10, 2019 by Dr. Sandra E. Cohen

The historical jury is out as to whether Queen Anne of England (1702 -1714) and her two ladies were actual lovers. Yet, sex makes for a good story; and sex wields power – in both what it has to offer and withhold. Envy, though, is the real name of the sexual game at the center …

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How Envy Plays Its Part
In Sexual Favors To A Queen?
Amy How A Psychoanalyst Looks At Her Freudian Fate & Bulimia

AMY
How A Psychoanalyst Looks At
Her “Freudian Fate” & Bulimia

August 2, 2015 by Dr. Sandra E. Cohen

Asif Kapadia’s deeply truthful, Amy, makes something very clear. Although Amy Winehouse predicted fame would “drive her mad,” it was more her psychological troubles that set her on a fatal downward spiral. The lyrics to What Is It About Men – “my Freudian fate. History repeats itself. It fails to die,” only touch the surface …

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How A Psychoanalyst Looks At
Her “Freudian Fate” & Bulimia
ADDICTION Realistic Characters 101 Addicted Fails

ADDICTED
Realistic Characters 101
Addicted Fails

January 5, 2015 by Dr. Sandra E. Cohen

Watching Billie Woodruff’s Addicted, I could barely restrain myself from grabbing a tomato and joining my Rotten Tomatoes compadres in throwing it at the screen. The 8% of critics who gave their approval of this psychologically offensive project must have been feeling particularly generous that day. What could have been a sensitive and even insightful look at a woman struggling …

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Realistic Characters 101
Addicted Fails
My Old Lady Stories of the Past Self-Hate or Liberating Truth?

MY OLD LADY
Stories of a Past
Self-Hate or Liberating Truth?

January 5, 2015 by Dr. Sandra E. Cohen

The way any one of us lives with the past is a complicated thing. My Old Lady, a deeply psychological and sometimes shockingly honest film written and directed by Israel Horovitz, takes us layer upon layer into the kinds of deeply wrought emotional problems living with a difficult past can bring. Matthias Gold (Kevin Kline) lives …

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Stories of a Past
Self-Hate or Liberating Truth?
LOVE IS STRANGE No. This is the Best Kind of Love

LOVE IS STRANGE
No. This Is The Best Of Love

January 5, 2015 by Dr. Sandra E. Cohen

Ben (John Lithgow) and George’s (Alfred Molina) relationship, in Ira Sach’s virtuoso film, Love Is Strange, celebrates the best of love. Love can bring many things – happiness, joy and companionship, yes. But, also, conflict, mismatch, disappointment, hurt, and loss.  The specialness of Love Is Strange is how this film gives us an open window into just what adult …

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No. This Is The Best Of Love
Boyhood Feeling Stuff is the Point of Life

BOYHOOD
Feeling Stuff is the Point of Life

January 5, 2015 by Dr. Sandra E. Cohen

Boyhood, Richard Linklater’s beautiful new film, is so compellingly real it’s easy to forget we aren’t watching a 12-year documentary of an actual family. With deft cinematic strokes, Linklater melds one phase of this family’s life. And Mason’s (Ellar Coltrane) journey through adolescence from ages 6 – 18, moves seamlessly into the next. Yet, Linklater’s …

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Feeling Stuff is the Point of Life
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Inspiration

“We come to Film and TV to find our hidden stories. If we look deeply into a character’s psyche, there is much to see about ourselves.”

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