Through the development of psychoanalytically informed film interpretation, Andreas Hamburger provides new insights into the experience of watching films and their influence upon our internal lives.

Building upon a relational understanding of psychoanalysis, this volume develops a methodical procedure for psychoanalytical film interpretation, discusses individual aspects of the medium – such as editing, spatial and temporal design – and puts approaches to film psychoanalysis and cinema theory into a systematic perspective. Hamburger exemplifies his arguments in a detailed analysis of numerous film examples and demonstrates how an in-depth encounter with the medium can provoke new and surprising understandings.

Providing an interdisciplinary perspective that crosses the study of popular culture with psychoanalytic theory, this book will be required reading not only for students and scholars of film, but also for psychoanalysts in practice and training.