Reading Time: 13 minutesOverview Cognitive film theory studies how the spectator understands a film moment by moment. It emerged in the late 1980s through theorists such as David Bordwell and Noël Carroll, who rejected psychoanalytic models in favour of the viewer as an active, rational perceiver. It focuses on the viewing tasks the spectator performs while watching: noticing… Continue reading Cognitive Film Theory: Definition, History, and Method