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Cinematherapy uses the personal resonance of films to help clients explore their inner worlds.

We can at once want to escape what we feel and reckon with it.

By sparking feelings and bodily responses in a safe place, a movie can make painful emotions more accessible.

Sometimes it's easier to connect with our feelings while watching someone else’s story unfold—in the dark among a crowd of strangers. Enter cinematherapy, an adjunct to psychotherapy that uses the personal resonance of films to help clients explore their inner worlds. One framework describes the process in four stages: identification with a character, catharsis, insight into oneself, and universalization—the recognition that we are not alone in our experiences. Research on cinematherapy is in its early days, but the approach offers a novel way to explore difficult feelings.

Take "Fall," the 2022 survival thriller. Becky has withdrawn from life following her husband Dan’s death in a climbing accident. Her friend proposes climbing an abandoned, 2,000-foot television tower to scatter his ashes and help her move forward.

Similarly, "Fall 2: Deadpoint" begins with another loss and another climb. Jax and Luce, who have lost a sister and a friend, respectively,........

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