Cinema Therapy and Filmmaking Therapy, Ways to Prevent Bullying and to Heal Bullied Children

Abstract


 
 
 Given its wide appeal as an entertainment method, cinema can be easily adapted in order to be used as a therapeutic and educational tool. Anxiety, which, in children, is considered to be both an important cause and consequence of bullying, can be healed through cinema, thanks to the experience of the happy end and the theory of identification with the character that help the child reach a state of harmony and contentment at the end of the story. Moreover, as bullying can often cause PTSD, which is a multi-sensory disorder, filmmaking therapy can be especially helpful as it can offer an audiovisual narrative approach to trauma. Also, the creative processes of filmmaking, such as writing, expressing through visuals, sound and music, could help children learn certain therapeutic creative methods that they could then use throughout their lives to express future inner tensions that could appear, contributing to an improved quality of life.