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Characters On The Couch

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

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Bridge of Spies A Standing Man How Integrity Triumphs Over Fear

BRIDGE OF SPIES
A Standing Man
How Integrity Triumphs Over Fear

February 26, 2016 by Dr. Sandra E. Cohen

Steven Spielberg’s powerful film, Bridge of Spies, asks some compelling psychological questions. Could there be two more different men than a Brooklyn lawyer in 1957 at the height of the Cold War and an alleged Russian spy – or are they different at all? And, if they aren’t, what is it exactly that forms an unexpected …

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A Standing Man
How Integrity Triumphs Over Fear
SAVING MR BANKS: You Think This Movie is About Saving Mr. Banks ... Oh Dear

You Think This Movie is About SAVING MR. BANKS? Oh, Dear…

July 31, 2014 by Dr. Sandra E. Cohen

Saving Mr. Banks takes many of us back to delicious childhood memories of Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke singing “Jolly Holiday,” “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious,” “Let’s Go Fly a Kite,” and “A Spoonful of Sugar Makes The Medicine Go Down.” Yet, what we couldn’t know as children is the heartbreaking story behind PL Travers’ Mary Poppins; a trauma …

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CAPTAIN PHILLIPS Can Ruthlessness and Empathy Coexist?

CAPTAIN PHILLIPS
Can Violence & Empathy Coexist?

July 31, 2014 by Dr. Sandra E. Cohen

I grip my armrests. As Captain Phillips begins, the theater becomes the USS Maersk Alabama. We, the audience, are the crew, stormed by Somali pirates bent on winning their power battle no matter what. It’s terrifying, and Paul Greengrass’s riveting documentary-style film Captain Phillips makes that terror almost unbearable. But there’s more to the film than …

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Can Violence & Empathy Coexist?

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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