• Skip to main content
  • Skip to header right navigation
  • Skip to site footer
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • Mail

Characters On The Couch

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

  • Home
  • Blog
  • About Sandra E. Cohen, PhD
  • Entertainment Consulting
  • Psychology & Story
  • Leo Hurwitz’s Documentaries
  • Contact

racism

the-green-book-life-friendship-love-characters-on-the-couch

THE GREEN BOOK
What Do 2 Unlikely Travel Companions Teach Each Other
About Life & Friendship & Love?

February 3, 2019 by Dr. Sandra E. Cohen

Peter Farrelly’s The Green Book poses a challenging question: what do 2 unlikely road companions possibly have to teach each other? A lot … even about friendship and love. But, with all their obvious differences, it’s an emotionally rocky road trip to get there. One of the 2 is Dr. Donald Shirley, a classically trained …

Read moreTHE GREEN BOOK
What Do 2 Unlikely Travel Companions Teach Each Other
About Life & Friendship & Love?
Leo Hurwitz Strange Victory Hate's Purpose

LEO HURWITZ
STRANGE VICTORY 1948
Hate: Its Tenacity and Its Purpose

November 13, 2017 by Dr. Sandra E. Cohen

Leo Hurwitz’s powerful 1948 WWII documentary, with its ironic title Strange Victory (Watch Here), is just as timely today as it was then. Because the film explores the inescapable question: “If we won, why do we look as if we lost? And, if Hitler died, why does his voice still pursue us through the spaces …

Read moreLEO HURWITZ
STRANGE VICTORY 1948
Hate: Its Tenacity and Its Purpose
charleston-shooting-characters-on-the-couch

CHARLESTON TRAGEDY
Psychotherapy Or Gun Control
For Violent Haters?

June 20, 2015 by Dr. Sandra E. Cohen

Gun control versus mental health intervention for the risk of extreme violence like we saw recently in Charleston? Mental health services aren’t the answer. Therapy takes too long and someone like Dylan Roof would have to know the problem is his for therapy to be effective. Clearly, Dylan Roof has serious psychological problems. The obvious …

Read moreCHARLESTON TRAGEDY
Psychotherapy Or Gun Control
For Violent Haters?
AMERICAN CRIME What Makes Barb The Racist She Is?

AMERICAN CRIME
What’s Made Barb The Racist She Is?

March 14, 2015 by Dr. Sandra E. Cohen

Racism is a symptom in American Crime – a troubling and destructive one, to be sure. But, like any symptom, it has its personal roots. As a psychoanalyst, my work is to find the roots of any symptom brought into my office. And, with the multi-storied American Crime unfolding each week, the roots of Matt’s …

Read moreAMERICAN CRIME
What’s Made Barb The Racist She Is?

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.”

Recent Posts

Everything Everywhere All At Once Breaking Out of Someone Else's Box
Nomadland: A Lonely Nomad in the Land of Loss
The Power of the Dog Why Phil Burbank’s Cruelty is About What He Hates in Himself
SOUND OF METAL How Silence Stops A Man From Running

Copyright © 2023 · Sandra E. Cohen, Ph.D. · All Rights Reserved