ABSTRACT
Wilfred Bion's theory of thinking infuses every aspect of his psychoanalytic approach and is instrumental for the reorientation of psychoanalysis for film theory, one that emphasizes affect and emotional experience. This chapter outlines its specific aspects, positioning it as a meta-structure for the book within relevant historical developments particular to object-relations psychoanalysis, highlights the influence of Melanie Klein. It examines the purchase of Bion's revision of Melanie Klein's theory of projective identification. The chapter discusses how Bion's interrelated conceptualizations of thinking and lived experience move away from the cathectic emphasis within Freudian psychoanalysis, that is the motivation of libidinal energy, toward an attention on the motivation of feelings about the people and environments relate to and associate with. T. Ogden's principles highlight the rationale behind Bion's theory of thinking as a cohesive model that concentrates on affect and emotional experience presents a core challenge to the dominance of classical psychoanalysis within theories of spectatorship and moving image experience.
