"I chose not to choose life, I chose something else" : Film and drugs: a thematic analysis of fictional films with an historical and psychoanalytical perspective

Ever since the birth of the film medium, stories about drugs and addiction have been produced. There is a fascination with the lifestyle, the effects of drugs and the ways in which it can be portrayed on the screen. The thesis starts off by giving an historical context, ranging from the late 19th Century and up until today, describing how the society and the public have treated the subject and how the narrative mirrors these attitudes. The purpose of the thesis is to take a closer look at this recurrent theme. Eleven fictional films produced between the 1980’s and 2000’s have been chosen and psychoanalytical film theory is used to analyze the ways in which the addict is represented; how filmic disgust and the abject makes the characters tread over physical and social boundaries and how the effect of the drug have the character tread over mental boundaries through dreams and hallucinations