Do movies make a difference in our lives? Of course they do. We are human beings and we learn from what we see, hear and feel. Movies offer it all.
Even when the experience is indirect and we only imagine ourselves on paper, movies affect us due to the combined impact of music, dialogue, lighting, camera angles, and sound effects that allow a film to bypass. our ordinary defensive censors.
We can become emotionally receptive and energized by an uplifting message, or we can become numb to violent behavior. But, like no other medium before, the popular film presents the potential for a new power for therapeutic success. It is up to us to see that potential and use it creatively and beneficially.
Cineterapia is an evaluation tool. While many adults benefit from talking about problems, thoughts, dreams, or emotions in psychotherapy, most children and teens find it more difficult to express those feelings. A young child’s response to movies can help the therapist understand the child’s current personality, concerns, interests, or problems. In a child’s choice of movies, we can find clues about their role models … ideal personal images, inner resources, potential goals, perceived obstacles, degrees of imagination and creativity, and their overall philosophy of life. Cinema Therapy allows children to express feelings that may be too threatening to express directly.
Movies can also be used to get to the bottom of tough problems. Movies provide common ground for discussions about issues related to family, friendship, school, anxiety, self-esteem, or love. Problems can be approached in relation to an external element, and seeing how an individual in a movie handles a situation can offer children ideas on how to deal with a problem in their own lives. Key scenes, watched over and over again, can become the basis for practicing new skills. Many movies allow children and adolescents to imagine how they can solve their own problems when the characters demonstrate a change in behavior.
Many movies, like dreams, are full of metaphors and symbols that affect us on a deep level. Carl Jung believed that as the mind explores the symbol, it is led to ideas that are beyond the reach of reason. Metaphors and symbols stimulate bilateral thinking and creativity; creating a bridge to the subconscious and avoiding the normal ego defenses often found in traditional therapeutic approaches.
Myths and stories can help people place their own personal history and the stories of others in the proper context. All myths and stories have a villain and tell great stories of a journey a hero must embark on. Likewise, young people are on a journey of heart and soul.
Filmmaking can be seen as the contemporary form of mythmaking, reflecting our response to ourselves and to the mysteries and wonders of our existence. Movies can have a powerful effect on children and adolescents because they speak directly to the heart and spirit, avoiding resistance from the conscious mind.
Cineatherapy can offer insights, role models and options for more positive behaviors, but its limit is in its indirect nature. We are observing, perhaps internalizing, but we are not necessarily doing it. Unless a child actively and consciously participates in behavior change, Kinetherapy lacks the element of experiential learning.
While Cinema Therapy is an evaluation tool, the filmmaking process becomes a concrete tool for behavior change. This is experiential learning at its finest, because it is creative and requires a child or adolescent to actively participate in its creation by becoming self-aware. A child becomes the hero of his own movie and is actively involved in his own journey to healthy behavior and adulthood. In essence, a child now becomes his own teacher and is learning about himself while watching the movie, over and over again. She is becoming the behavior she admires and is solving her own problems while acting within her own scene and as her own role model. The MovieMaking Process was nominated to the SAMHSA Academy of Service to Science in 2008 as one of the most promising prevention programs in the Midwest for its unique fusion of creativity, technology, and human development.
The movie making process starts with the problem to be addressed and then focuses on the desired result. The movie becomes the hero’s journey to solve the problem and demonstrate more positive behavior. If bullying is the problem, the focus of the film is kindness, the hero learns through his cinematic experience how he feels, how he looks, and how it affects others. The movie is often based on a myth or story from ancient times, but our hero is the boy.
The filmmaking process uses gorilla filming techniques, which is basically the ingenuity of what we have available at any given time. This can be in a child’s home, backyard, neighborhood, park, or schoolyard. It is the creative process of choosing a theme and assembling, or creating, the props that make the movie into a movie. Kids and teens love creating their own costumes and their costumes represent the hero they want to become.
The movie is shot like a silent movie, using gestures and expressions. This is an important part of child development, learning and recognizing the subtleties of human feelings, expressed non-verbally in facial expressions and physical postures. This also allows any child to participate. It is not necessary to learn and memorize lines, just act out the part, expressing the emotion through physical expression.
The movie is often shot through reflection. A child is reminiscing about something from his past, perhaps an incident that has caused emotional pain to himself or others. The movie is the journey through emotional pain to resolution and a happy ending. The movie always ends with resolution and hope. The journey is complete and the hero is more aware, more skilled, and can now see the incident from a new perspective.
Narration is added after editing the movie. Narration is the story that tells the story of the hero looking at his past, overcoming obstacles, learning new behaviors, seeing new perspectives, and becoming more than he was before. Using voice over narration, rather than trying to shoot a talking movie, keeps the focus on facial expressions, body language and action, plus it is very cost-effective in time and money.
Music is added to the entire movie. Music that is meaningful to the child or adolescent is best and is intended to create the emotional feelings that are important for behavior change. We must feel inspired to change behavior and we must feel hopeful. Music can take us to those heights. While the use of copyrighted music is a very serious problem these days, there are always musicians in every community who want their music to be heard and used. There is also a lot of royalty-free music on the Web.
It is essential that a child’s entire movie be released with as much fanfare as possible. Inviting family and friends to watch the full movie is an important element in creating new behavior. Most kids and teens like to watch their movie over and over again. This strengthens the new learning and each visualization reinforces that learning. Now a child is learning from the movie he created. You are learning that you can be your own hero and that you can navigate life’s difficulties with awareness, skills, and hope. You are no longer just watching, you have been actively involved, and that is the great power of experiential learning.