Mulholland Drive (2001)
A self‐psychology perspective
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 8972645 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Joseph Barbera (750 Dundas St W, 259, Box 22, Toronto, ON ‐ M6J 3S3, Canada ‐, corresponding author), Henry J Moller (0000-0003-1507-4902, ECW‐3D‐030, Toronto Western Hospital, 399 Bathurst St, Toronto, ON ‐ M5T 2S8, Canada ‐) |
| Year | 2007 |
| Volume | 88 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 515-526 |
| Publication date | 2007-04-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The International Journal of Psychoanalysis (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0020-7578 • E-ISSN: 1745-8315 |
| Publisher | Taylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1516/572n-9x75-620r-3816 |
| PMID | 17392064 |
| OpenAlex | W2116272109 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 9 |
This fi lm has been lauded by critics as original and insightful, while at the same time accused by many of being incoherent and meaningless. In teasing out its complex narrative, most would agree that the fi rst two-thirds of the fi lm represent the dream of its central character—Diane Selwyn—with the last third representing her reality (e.g. Bulkeley, 2003). This recognition explains the more bizarre features of the fi lm, their bizarreness being attributable to the primary process that drives any dream. Furthermore, various elements within the dream narrative may be related to a more overarching narrative structure simply as a form of day residue. This helps solve the ‘mystery’ established by the fi lm’s narrative. At best, however, this provides only a superfi cial understanding of the fi lm, or rather the fi lm’s central story, namely the psychological confl ict of its central character. As Lentzner and Ross (2005) have discussed, Mulholland Drive is best understood within the framework of dream analysis, where dreams are seen as unfolding in accordance to their own language and logic. Mulholland Drive is open to the same psychological interpretation as any dream, with its manifest content serving to reveal its latent psychological meaning. To this end, Lentzner and Ross (2005), McDowell (2005), and Tang [internet] have approached Mulholland Drive from a traditional Freudian perspective. Lentzner and Ross (2005), for example, characterize Diane’s dream as a compromise formation between her wish to destroy her competitor Camilla, and her guilt over the consequences of her murderous actions. McDowell (2005) emphasizes the role of unexplained oedipal confl icts in explaining Diane’s sadomasochistic behavior, with Camilla acting as a surrogate mother-fi gure. Given the rich illustration of themes of narcissism throughout the fi lm, it is striking that no psychoanalytic review has explored its cinematic content from a Kohutian perspective. We present here an analysis of the fi lm from the perspective of self-psychology
Art · Perspective (graphical · Psychoanalysis · Psychoanalytic theory · Self psychology · Visual arts · Jungian Analytical Psychology · Psychology · Psychotherapy Techniques and Applications · Sleep and Wakefulness Research · Social Psychology
| Highly cited | No |
|---|