Member-only story
Sixteen More Films to Teach Trauma and Trauma Recovery
A curriculum for a general audience
Content warning: the following contains references to diverse forms of trauma.
Three years ago I created a list of sixteen films that depicted diverse aspects of trauma and trauma recovery with the idea that they could be used to train trauma therapists. Since then, Sixteen Films to Teach Trauma and Trauma Recovery: A curriculum for therapists has had 47,000 views to-date — by far the most-read article I’ve ever written.
When I expressed disbelief at this number to a colleague, she said, “You’re giving them what they want.” As society slowly erodes the stigma of mental health treatment, more and more people want to learn about trauma and trauma recovery. And we love film, partly because it offers a safe, private (if we wish), self-contained classroom to explore topics we care about.
Inspired by this understanding, I decided to create this sequel list. This time, I’m trying less to create a curriculum for therapists than to offer psycho-education about trauma and trauma recovery for a general audience. The selection criteria I’ve used for choosing films for this second list are: 1) diversity: of different kinds of trauma, eras, and cultures, including two documentaries and one animated film; 2) realism: in the films’…
