The Power of Movies and a Method to Study It
Popular cinema has been around a long time; much has remained constant, much has changed. This chapter broaches some of the changes in and around movies during the past century. These changes have been made to boost viewers’ engagement, which depends on at least four psychological dimensions: their sustained attention, their understanding of the narrative, their emotional commitment, and their feeling of presence in the story. The chapter also provides an overview of two methods of academic study in the sciences and humanities—the case study method and the wider sampling, statistical method. It then lays out the case for studying many movies as a sampled group, but it also knowledges pitfalls. Nonetheless, study of many movies has a great number of things to offer, for each of the movies and for understanding the nature of the human mind.