LACAN'S MIRROR THEORY:
Overview:
Film theorists adapted Jacques Lacan's psychological theory of the mirror stage to discuss how film reflects not its time and place of creation (like the other mirror theory), but its audience. Lacan argues that when a child begins to recognize that he or she is seeing his or her own image in a mirror (rather than another child) he or she begins to see the "self" as an object that can be acted upon, owned, or mastered. So, by extension, Lacan argues that anything people see, we see as an object, and get a sense of power over it. The feeling of power decreases if we ourselves can be seen and objectified, but it increases greatly (in a voyeuristic way) if we can see without being seen. Lacan called this the power of the gaze. Film gives audiences that very power. An audience member can view the people and objects on the screen with no danger that those objects and people can look back.
The effect of this phenomena can be an almost addictive reaction to film and the film experience. It can also lead to an alteration of the audience's own identities when audience members begin to see themselves (or aspects of their personalities) reflected in the characters they watch on the screen. Because the audience members now "own" or "master" those aspects, they can adopt them. The audience members then "suture" their own identities to those they gaze at on the screen. In effect, the film reflects the audience, and the audience ends up reflecting the film. Obviously, this theory is an attempt to explain the relationship between the audience and the film.
The effect of this phenomena can be an almost addictive reaction to film and the film experience. It can also lead to an alteration of the audience's own identities when audience members begin to see themselves (or aspects of their personalities) reflected in the characters they watch on the screen. Because the audience members now "own" or "master" those aspects, they can adopt them. The audience members then "suture" their own identities to those they gaze at on the screen. In effect, the film reflects the audience, and the audience ends up reflecting the film. Obviously, this theory is an attempt to explain the relationship between the audience and the film.
Method:
Analyses using Lacan's Mirror Theory focus on exploring and explaining how the film offers the audience opportunities to objectify the characters and own or master the objects presented in the production. Writers should also indicate how the film tempts audiences to suture themselves and their identities to the images they see on the screen in the same way that infants suture their identity to their reflection in the mirror.