1st Edition

Collective Trauma and the Psychology of Secrets in Transnational Film

By Deborah Lynn Porter Copyright 2018
    262 Pages
    by Routledge

    262 Pages 26 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    Collective Trauma and the Psychology of Secrets in Transnational Film advances a methodological line of inquiry based on a fresh insight into the ways in which cinematic meaning is generated and can be ascertained. Premised on a critical reading strategy informed by a metapsychology of secrets, the book features analyses of internationally acclaimed films—Guillermo del Torro’s Pan’s Labyrinth, Andrey Zvyagintsev’s The Return, Jee-woon Kim’s A Tale of Two Sisters, and Alejandro Amenábar’s The Others. It demonstrates how a rethinking of the figure of the secret in national film yields a new vantage point for examining heretofore unrecognized connections between collective historical experience, cinematic production and a transnational aesthetic of concealment and hiding.

    Preface



    1. New Psychoanalytical Tools for Historical Inquiry



    2. Haunted Inheritance: Fantasy as Phantom in Guillermo del Toro’s Pan’s Labyrinth



    3. Uncanny Reunions as Metapsychoanalytical Trope in Andrey Zvagintsev’s The Return



    4. Imperial Legacy, Aborted Mourning and the Meaning of Horror in Kim Jee-Woon’s A Tale of Two Sisters



    5. The Religious Specter: Identifying the Intruder in Alejandro Amenábar’s The Others



    Epilogue



    Biography

    Deborah Porter is Associate Professor in the Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington, USA