The Audience Gaze and The Absent Object: Lacan Object a, and Film Psychoanalysis

Image is rooted in the viewer’s desire to gaze. A narrative film, with all its visual capacities, draws the desire for viewing towards the main plot of the narrative; this is done by objectifying the plot as a visual object, making it spectacular in order to respond to the audience’s desire to gaze. This visual object, dependent on textual desire of the film, can be portrayed (as) - faces, iconic characters, places & objects, abstract visual elements which symbolize a special concept – in different shapes. However, a group of films based on religious issues which portray Saints, the desired object of gaze is eliminated from the visual realm. This would help to organize the desire of gaze around their iconic absence. The latter causes a special circumstance for the viewer and his psychological situation in confronting the images. This is the core axis of the present research which tries to give its explanations & analysis based on Lacanian psychology. The related critical framework of object  a  is the centre of focus in this research; this is done by explaining meanings such as textual desire, gaze and object a, while giving comparative analogy. The position of viewer and his confrontation with present & absent object and finally the effect of object’s absence on viewer are studied.