Examines the long history of developments in modern art, science and technology that brought psychoanalysis and the cinema together towards the end of the nineteenth century. Vicky Lebeau explores the subsequent encounters between the two and goes on to offer a detailed reading of the texts and concepts which generated the field of psychoanalytic film theory, a core area of Film Studies. Examines the long history of developments in modern art, science and technology that brought psychoanalysis and the cinema together towards the end of the nineteenth century. Vicky Lebeau explores the subsequent encounters between the two: the seductions of psychoanalysis and cinema as converging, though distinct, ways of talking about dream and desire, image and illusion, shock and sensuality. Beginning with Freud's encounter with hysteria on deiplay in fin-de-siecle Paris this study offers a detailed reading of the texts and concepts which generated the field of psychoanalytic film theory, a core area of Film Studies.