Objective of the Film Series

The NCP film series allow clinicians to explore psychoanalytic concepts in an open and exciting discussion format. By using the dynamics of film characters and plots as metaphors for the projections of mental states we can gain an understanding of dynamics of people who come to us for help. Movies are geared to mental health professionals and general public who are interested in psychoanalytic ideas.

• • Discuss the impact of psychoanalytic thought which reoccurs in the character portrayals of actors;

• • Explore multiple psychoanalytic concepts through character’s development;

• • Uncover key elements of psychoanalysis through interrelationships of characters and characterological deviations.
  

Eight Friday Nights
March – June 2008
Time:  7:30 PM
Place: New Center for Psychoanalysis
Cost:  $10 per film for general public;
$20 for mental health professionals receiving 2.5 CE Credits
CE Credits: 2.5

The Treatment
March 14, 2008
(based on Daniel Menaker's novel)
Screenplay by Daniel Saul Housman, who will attend screening for a discussion.
The ever-changing role of psychoanalysis this movie, The Treatment, stirs up many issues related to psychoanalytic movement in today’s contemporary world. Dr. Morales plays the role an old schooled European psychoanalyst “the last Freudian,” with a patient Jake whose life strictly evolves around his on-going never ending analysis.  Jake is finally forced to terminate his treatment when his analyst, Dr. Morales, orders him to leave, never to return and to “get a life.”  Analysand Jake Singer, is forced to confront his self-defeating and passive behaviors, but also his ambivalence to his eccentric analyst.

Dr. Morales’ prods and provokes Jake, sometimes effectively, sometimes questionably, replicating the good and bad of his relationships to male authority figures like his principal, the basketball coach, and his father.  With a touch of the absurd, traditional and modern treatment modalities come into play as Dr. Morales and Jake try to sort out his tangled love and family relations, self-esteem, and abilities as a teacher.   What transpires then is a spoof of an entangled love relations, comprised various lovers, family members, star crossed lovers, and an entire array of modern treatment modalities.  Beyond the absurd and the absurdity, this film provides a host of issues that face psychoanalysis today.
For more info on this film...

Discussant:  Joan Lachkar, Ph.D. is an affiliate member and faculty of NCP Extension Program and is in private practice in the Valley and Los Angeles.


Crimes & Misdemeanors
April 11, 2008
This 1989 release is Woody Allen's tragic-comic meditation on guilt in a universe without moral force. Martin Landau, a successful doctor, contemplates murdering a former mistress who threatens his easy life while Woody Allen, an unsuccessful filmmaker, contemplates having an extramarital affair. A subplot involves Allen making a film about his successful, conceited brother-in-law (Alan Alda). This film, alongside Annie Hall may be one of Woody Allen's greatest achievements.
For more info on this film...

Discussants:  Thomas Brod, M.D. is on the faculty of the New Center, Associate Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at UCLA, and conducts a private practice in West Los Angeles.
Apurva Shah, M.D. divides his year practicing in Lancaster, CA and teaching in Ahmedabad, India.  He trained in Adult and Child Psychiatry at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, NYC, and was a candidate at the NY Psychoanalytic Institute prior to returning to India.


Capote
April 18, 2008
Director Bennett Miller's movie follows Truman Capote (played by Philip Seymour Hoffman) on his odyssey to create the landmark bestseller In Cold Blood. Capote attempts to charm the locals and work his way into the story behind the murders. He is soon shocked to find himself forming a friendship with one of the killers.
For more info on this film...

Discussant:  Bettina Soestwohner, Ph.D. has a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from UC Irvine. She is a graduate Research Psychoanalyst and faculty member at the New Center for Psychoanalysis, and a training and supervising analyst at the Newport Psychoanalytic Institute. She also is a member of the California Circle of the Freudian School of Quebec   She works in private practice in Los Angeles and Newport Beach.


Fargo
April 25, 2008
In 1995, the remarkable Coen brothers made Fargo, a tale of kidnapping, extortion and murder during a harsh Minnesota winter. The story was framed by a delightful, pregnant chief of police (Frances McDormand) who is adept at catching criminals but doesn’t understand them. The discussant examines this wonderful film in relation to No Country for Old Men, the latest Coen brothers’ masterpiece, which will be shown subsequently.
For more info on this film...

Discussant:  M. Brandon French, Ph.D., MFT is a former Yale professor of English and film, reviews film for radio and magazines.  She also maintains a private practice in LA.


No Country For Old Men
May 2, 2008
The Coen brothers’ No Country for Old Men is a gritty fable of evil, innocence, and the vicissitudes of chance in a post 9/11 story set in the southwest. Many of the same thematic elements that are in Fargo (shown previously) appear here, but in a far darker light, leaving our expectations for some kind of redemption relentlessly confounded. It will be up to the NCP audience to decide if the final dream recounted in the film is hopeful, or merely a confirmation of worldly despair.
For more info on this film...

Discussant:  M. Brandon French, Ph.D., MFT


Secretary
May 16, 2008
An amazing interplay of sadomasochistic relationship and an old-fashioned romance!
Making love is not always done in traditional classic ways. Sometimes what can be viewed by some as a psychopathology, can be the essence of two people‘s expression of love and closeness. Who said that love needs to be soft and tender? Psychoanalytic perspectives are used to explore the dynamics of sadomasochistic relationship and connection with intimacy and sexual excitement.
For more info on this film...

Discussant:  Elena Balashova-Shamis, Psy.D. is a Clinical Associate at NCP, maintains a clinical private practice in Santa Monica, in addition to teaching at local universities, and presenting many varied courses for continuing education.


Little Man
May 30, 2008
The film Little Man is a provocative documentary by producer, Nicole Conn. It chronicles the life of her son - his conception via artificial insemination, gestation in a surrogate mother with one kidney, and birth at the 25^th week under the threat of eclampsia. Born with a weight of about a pound, multiple malformations and a probability of surviving less than 0.00004, he spent his first 158 days at the NICU, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles suffering from renal failure, intestinal surgery, cardiac arrest, severe vision and hearing pathology, along with profound developmental challenges. The next two years of the boy’s life in the family of lesbian partners and their older daughter unfolds profound psychological and ethical conflicts. The film dwells on the dilemmas of the baby-mother relationship, emotional attachment, love-hate ambivalence, victim-aggressor controversy and dialectics of sacrifice and destructivity. The film also raises questions about the relationship between a personal confession, a pitiless self-exploration, and a narcissistically manufactured commercial.
For more info on this film...

Discussant:  Elena Bezzubova M.D., Ph.D. is a Candidate at the New Center of Psychoanalysis, faculty in College of Medicine, University of California Irvine.


Alice
June 6, 2008
Woody Allen strikes again in 1990 creating Alice starring Joe Mantegna, William Hurt, Mia Farrow, Alec Baldwin, and Cybil Shepherd. This film followed Crimes and Misdemeanors, explores the theme of moral disorder with a comedic palate and a whimsical mood. Allen adds a wizard figure of inscrutable wisdom and power who manifests the childish wish for an omnipotent guide in the face of danger.
For more info on this film...

Discussants:  Thomas Brod, M.D. and Apurva Shah, M.D.

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Eight Friday Nights
March – June 2008
Time:  7:30 PM
Place: New Center for Psychoanalysis
Cost:  $10 per film for general public;
$20 for mental health professionals receiving 2.5 CE Credits
CE Credits: 2.5

back to top