Biography

Dr. Tarja Laine (Finland, 1971), Assistant Professor in Film Studies, is the author of Reframing Trauma in Contemporary Fiction Film (2023),  Emotional Ethics of The Hunger Games (2021),  Bodies in Pain: Emotion and the Cinema of Darren Aronofsky (2015),  Feeling Cinema: Emotional Dynamics in Film Studies (2011) and Shame and Desire: Emotion, Intersubjectivity, Cinema (2007). Her essays on emotions and sensations in cinema and media have been published in journals such as Film-Philosophy, Midwest Studies in Philosophy, Media, Culture & Society, Discourse: Journal for Theoretical Studies in Media and Culture, Studies in European Cinema, New Review of Film and Television Studies, PostScript and Film and Philosophy . Her research interests include cinematic emotions, film aesthetics and film-phenomenology.

Selected Publications

Books

Reframing Trauma in Contemporary Fiction Film. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2023.

Emotional Ethics of The Hunger Games. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021.

Bodies in Pain: Emotion and the Cinema of Darren Aronofsky. New York: Berghahn Books, 2015. 

Feeling Cinema: Emotional Dynamics in Film Studies. New York: Continuum, 2011. 

Shame and Desire: Emotion, Intersubjectivity, Cinema. Brussels: P.I.E. Peter Lang, 2007.

Contributions to books  

“Not Quite Romantic Comedy.” In Gender: Laughter, edited by Bettina Papenburg, 55-69. Macmillan Interdisciplinary Handbooks, Farmington Hills: Macmillan Reference.

"Religion as Environmental Ethics: Darren Aronofsky’s Noah." In Close Encounters between Bible and Film: An Interdisciplinary Engagement, edited by Laura Copier and Caroline Vander Stichele, 173-183. Atlanta: SBL Press, 2016.

"Mea Maxima Vulva: Appreciation and aesthetics of chance in Nymphomaniac." In Lars von Trier's Women, edited by Rex Butler and David Denny, 233-246. New York: Bloomsbury, 2016.

"Negative Feelings as Emotional Enhancement in Cinema: The Case of Ulrich Seidl's Paradise Trilogy." In The Palgrave Handbook of Posthumanism in Film and Television, edited by Michael Hauskeller, Thomas D. Philbeck and Curtis D. Carbonell, 246-258. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015.

"Dangerous Liaisons and Counterfeit Affections: Cinema as Seduction." In Acting and Performance in Moving Image Culture: Bodies, Screens, Renderings, edited by Jörg Sternagel, Deborah Levitt and Dieter Mersch, 248-258. Bielefeld: Transcript, 2012.

"Hidden Shame Exposed: Hidden and the Spectator. In The Cinema of Michael Haneke, edited by Ben McCann and David Sorfa, 247-255. London: Wallflower Press, 2012.

"Haneke's 'Funny' Games with the Audience (Revisited)." In On Michael Haneke, edited by Brian Price and John David Rhodes, 51-62. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2010.

"Failed Tragedy and Traumatic Love in Ingmar Bergman's Shame ." In Mind the Screen: Media Concepts According to Thomas Elsaesser, edited by Jaap Kooijman, Patricia Pisters and Wanda Strauven, 60-70. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2008.

"Family Matters in Eat Drink Man Woman: Food Envy, Family Longing, or Intercultural Knowledge through the Senses?" In Shooting the Family: Transnational Media and Intercultural Values, edited by Patricia Pisters and Wim Staat, 103-114. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2005.

International refereed journals   

“Darren Aronofsky.” Oxford Bibliographies in Cinema and Media Studies. Ed. Krin Gabbard. New York: Oxford University Press, 25 October 2018. 

http://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/abstract/document/obo-9780199791286/obo-9780199791286-0305.xml

“Moves And Countermoves: Visual Technologies of Fear and Counter-Technologies of Hope in The Hunger Games Quadrilogy.” Cinephile 12:1.

http://cinephile.ca/wp-content/uploads/Cinephile-12.1.pdf

"Art as a Guaranty for Sanity: The Skin I Live In." Alphaville: Journal of Film and Screen Media 7 (Summer 2014).

http://www.alphavillejournal.com/Issue7/HTML/ArticleLaine.html

"Imprisoned in Disgust: Roman Polanski's Repulsion ." Film-Philosophy 2 (2011): 35-50.

http://www.film-philosophy.com/index.php/f-p/article/view/275

"Entangled Life: The Double Life of Véronique ." Film and Philosophy 15 (2011): 127-136.

http://www.lhup.edu/dshaw/images/veron%202.pdf 

"SMS Scandals: Sex, Media and Politics in Finland." Media, Culture & Society 1 (2010): 151-160.

"'It's the Sense of Touch.' Skin in the Making of Cinematic Consciousness." Discourse: Journal for Theoretical Studies in Media and Culture 1(2007): 35-48.

"Lars von Trier, Dogville, and the Hodological Space of Cinema." Studies in European Cinema 2 (2006): 129-141.

International non-refereed journals  

" The Diving Bell and the Butterfly as an Emotional Event." Midwest Studies in Philosophy 1 (2010): 295-305.

"Affective Telepathy, or the Intuition of the Heart: Persona with Mulholland Drive ." New Review of Film and Television Studies 3 (2009): 325-338.

"The Synaesthetic Turn" (with Wanda Strauven). New Review of Film and Television Studies 3 (2009): 249-255.

"Love is a Dangerous Game: Power and the Rules of Intimacy in Michael Winterbottom's Code 46 ." Cinemascope 6 (2006).

 http://www.cinemascope.it.

"Cinema as Second Skin: Under the Membrane of Horror Film." New Review of Film and Television Studies 2 (2006): 93-106.

"Eija-Liisa Ahtila's Affective Images in House ." Mediascape 2 (2006).

http://www.tft.ucla.edu/mediascape/Spring06_Eija-LiisaAhtila.html

"Shame on Us: Shame, National Identity and the Finnish Doping Scandal." The International Journal of the History of Sport 1 (2006): 67-81.

" American Psycho : A Double Portrait of Serial Yuppie Patrick Bateman" (with Jaap Kooijman). PostScript 3 (2003): 46-56.

"Jim Carrey: The King of Embarrassment." CineAction 55 (2001): 50-56.

"Empathy, Sympathy and the Philosophy of Horror in Kubrick's The Shining ." Film and Philosophy (2001): 72-88.

Popular scientific journals

"The Bear Necessities: Steam of Life." In Media Res (2013).

 http://mediacommons.futureofthebook.org/imr/2013/01/30/bear-necessities-steam-life