Foreword
Ever Since Hugo Munsterberg offered the first scientifically-
based, psychological perspective on how movies affect movie-
goers in 1916, the courtship between psychology and motion
pictures has been a volatile, on-again, off-again affair with
libidinous spurts of heart, mind, and, occasionally, spleen.
Ironically, Munsterberg may have been the first to remark
about the psychological impact of this remarkable invention,
this magic lantern, yet it was the less rigorously empirical,
more boldly speculative but aesthetically far more appealing
psychoanalytic theory, which leapfrogged over the likes of
Munsterberg and his staid scientific psychology and quickly
colonized the film world.
Onscreen and off, psychoanalysts “explained” to the world
the surface and symbolic meaning of words, actions, and
images rambling or racing across movie screens, into the con-
scious and unconscious minds of rapt viewers. The psy-
chopathology of everyday life became the grist for Hollywood
films. While attending the movies, people were often first
exposed to such exotic terms and conditions as psychosis,
depression, hysteria, and the unfolding panoply of treatment
modalities that made terms like “psychotherapy,” “schizophre-
nia,” and “neurosis” integral parts of parlor conversation’s lex-
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