Once again, you’ll have the opportunity to watch a film, chosen by an experienced therapist, who will introduce the film and share some thoughts and ideas. This will be followed by a group discussion where we can have fun thinking about the psychoanalytic underpinnings of the film. The club is open to trainees and qualified Counsellors & Psychotherapists, as well as friends and family who also share a psychoanalytic bent and enjoy applying it to films!

You may attend as many films as you want, with each costing £35

To book a seat, please email the office – info@enfieldcounselling.co.uk with your choice of film and date, and make the £35 payment (per film) to the following account –

CAF BANK
Account no: 00009093
Sort Code: 40-52-40

• Please use your name and film’s date as payment reference.
• All club times are held on a Sunday from 9am – 12.pm.

Sun 21st Jan 2024

• Film – The Perverts Guide to Cinema (2006)
• Director – Sophie Fiennes – 150”
• Presenter – Richard White

In this documentary, philosopher and psychoanalyst Slavoj Zizek explores film’s ability to express personal subjectivity, fantasy and reality, desire and sexuality using as examples some of the best films ever made. A must see; this challenging documentary is the best visual introduction to the relationship between film and psychoanalytic theory that I’ve found; I can’t recommend it highly enough.

Sunday 25th February 2024

• Film  – A Matter of Life and Death (1946)
• Director –  Michael Powell & Emeric Pressberger /  104”
• Presenter  – Richard White

This is the story of two worlds, the one we know and another which exists only in the mind of a young airman whose life and imagination have been violently shaped by war. Any resemblance to any other world known or unknown is purely coincidental. “A romantic, daring and beautiful allegorical fantasy.” Martin Scorsese

Sunday 24th March 2024

• Film – Alien (1979)
• Director – Ridley Scott / 116”
• Presenter – Cameron Brown

‘ALIEN’ is Ridley Scott’s landmark classic, a dark atmospheric science fiction which struck terror into cinemagoers on its release in 1979. But what about now? Lurking not far beneath, ‘ALIEN’ provides a rich and fascinating representation of psychodynamic concepts such as birth trauma, sibling rivalry and the ‘bad’ mother. Cameron invites you to tolerate this film’s achingly slowburning tension and horror, and to immerse yourself in the many different themes within.

Sunday 21st April 2024

• Film –  Nil By Mouth (1997)
• Director – Gary Oldman / 128”
• Presenter – Julian Smith

The story of a family living in southeast London. Heavily based on experiences from the director’s early life growing up on a council estate. A film not for the lighthearted; alcoholism, violence, drug addiction & family dysfunctions are at its core. Roger Ebert awarded the film 3.5 out of 4, writing: “The film’s portrait of street life in South London is unflinching and observant.” Guardian critic Peter Bradshaw gave it five out of five, praising its performances and “pure invention, energy and seriousness”.

Sunday 19th May 2024

• Film – Phantom Thread (2017)
• Director – Paul Thomas Anderson / 130”
• Presenter – Richard White

Set in 1950s London, Reynolds Woodcock is a renowned dressmaker whose fastidious life is disrupted by a young, strong-willed woman who becomes his muse and lover. Central to relationships is what we try put inside each other and what it costs to accept or refuse the unconscious fit; often at odds with our conscious wants. Phantom Thread explores this conflict.

Sunday 23rd June 2024

• Film – Ida (2013)
• Director –  Paweł Pawlikowski  / 82”
• Presenter – Geoff Ferguson

A young woman uncovers her past. A controversial film, set in Stalinist Poland, Ida is a study in memory, guilt and identity. It is also a prize-winning film of remarkable beauty.

Sunday 21st July 2024

• Film – Apur Sansar (1959)
• Dir Satyajit Ray / 107”
• Presenter –  Richard White

Apu is in his early twenties, out of college, and hoping to live as a writer. Alongside his professional ambitions, the film charts his romantic awakening, which occurs as the result of a most unlikely turn of events, and his eventual, fraught fatherhood. This, the final chapter in Ray’s Apu trilogy, takes us firmly Beyond The Pleasure Principle.

Sunday, 15th September 2024

• Film – To Be Confirmed Sunday
• Director – To Be Confirmed Sunday
• Presenter – John Goodchild

Sunday, 13th October 2024

• Film – Nothing Personal (2009)
• Director – Urszula Antoniak / 84”
• Presenter: Richard White

Nothing Personal explores the limits of solitude. The human need for emotional and physical contact – and the fear of its responsibilities and costs. Isn’t this what we all experience in therapy?

Sunday, 17th November 2024

• Film – To be confirmed
• Director – To Be Confirmed Sunday
• Presenter: Evelyn Katz

Sunday, 15th December 2024

• Film – All that Heaven Allows (1955)
• Director – Douglas Sirk – 89”
• Presenter – Richard White

Sirk’s sumptuous but scathing melodrama explores the various obstacles and objections raised by a middleclass widow’s family and friends against her blossoming relationship with a younger, vaguely bohemian gardener. The exact, exquisite compositions and colours express a stultifying sense of entrapment by social conformism, materialism, and hypocrisy.

Presenters

Cameron Brown is a Psychodynamic Psychotherapist and lecturer in Freud and Object Relations at The College of North East London.

Evelyn Katz is a Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist and supervisor, who has worked in private practice for many years. She has a long-standing passion for cinema and enjoys applying psychoanalytic thinking to films.

Geoff Ferguson is a Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist in private practice for over 30 years. He teaches Psychoanalytic theory on several training courses.

John Goodchild is a Psychoanalyst and Supervisor.

Julian Smith is a Psychodynamic Therapist, Clinical Lead with an adult mental health social care provider based in Enfield & ECPS clinical supervisor.

Richard White is a former filmmaker and has lectured in film theory. A psychotherapist in private practice, working with individuals and relationships, he currently has a particular interest in the effect of the nuclear family on early life.