The film “Yes Man” invites exploration of our “default switches,” which serve as defensive strategies. Some of us tend to comply and accommodate by always saying yes. Others tend to rebel and shut down to new experiences by always saying no. Neither rebelling (by an automatic No) nor complying (by an automatic Yes) are real ways of establishing either independence in the first case or closeness in the second. Rebelling mimics autonomy and compliance mimics merging.

The movie, “Fight Club,” is a great example of how our psyches split into Good and Bad, acceptable and unacceptable. Additionally, it has much to say about contemporary male issues. Part of working with our Shadow is figuring out ways to express the repressed or hidden parts of ourselves without making a mess of our lives. In “Fight Club,” our hero eventually turns his rage into the ability to stand up for himself, and turns his aggression into assertiveness.

Through the archetypes of Hero and Villain, we split people and qualities into “good” and “bad,” what we deem as bad typically, for most of us, being repressed and put into our Shadow. In looking at the movie “Collateral” we will see an arc of transformation, as our “hero” reclaims some of the “bad” characteristics of the “villain” to become a more integrated and fully developed person.

A look at the psychotherapy-style relationship between the Duke of York and his speech therapist in ‘The King’s Speech’ (2010), starring Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush and Helena Bonham-Carter.