Dear Peggy,
You certainly make a good point about Dr. Melfi. But … everything is relative! She is still far better than the vast majority of female therapists depicted in the Hollywood cinema. In films ranging from Alfred Hitchcock’s 1945 Spellbound to Barbra Streisand’s Prince of Tides in 1991, one female therapist after another swoons for her male patient, who always looks like Richard Gere, Gregory Peck, Tony Curtis, or Nick Nolte. Typically, she leaves her practice to take up with her man. So what if he’s a patient? True love is much more important that professional ethics! This trend seems to have been totally unaffected by feminism. In fact, out of 450 American films that we reviewed, only two (Private Worlds and Last Embrace) actually depict a female therapist who effectively treats a male patient. So compared to this terribly sexist tradition, Jennifer comes off looking pretty decent. She may have countertransference, but she stays put in her chair and tries her best to help a very difficult patient.
Glen
