The patient on screen

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Molière’s The Imaginary Invalid mocks the medical profession on stage. Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain explores illness and death in a sanatorium for patients with lung diseases. And the television series ER portrays the dramatic everyday life of an emergency department. Theater, film, and literature have repeatedly placed medical themes at the center of their stories – shaping the way we perceive illness and medicine.

“Whether we are talking about depression, neurodegenerative diseases, or dying, the way people think about these issues does not depend solely on medical facts,” explains Professor Martin Fischer, Chair of Medical Education at LMU Munich. “Alongside personal experiences, socially and culturally established ideas also play a role.”

The new CAS Research Focus “Narrations of Medicine” at LMU Munich’s Center for Advanced Studies (CAS), of which Martin Fischer is one of the spokespersons, examines how these ideas emerge and what significance they have for medical practice. Researchers from medicine, the arts, humanities, and social sciences are working together to explore how cultural works portray illness and medical practice, and what research and teaching can learn from these portrayals.

Illness from a different perspective

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The humanities also have much to contribute to these questions, explains Professor Berenika Szymanski-Düll, another spokesperson for the Research Focus. “Theater and literary studies examine not only which images of illness and doctors appear in literary texts, theater productions, and performance works. They also ask which aesthetic and narrative techniques are used to create these images: Who speaks – and from whose perspective? Whose bodies and knowledge are made visible? Which metaphors, narrative perspectives, and dramatic techniques shape these portrayals?”

This approach helps researchers understand how perceptions of illness, medical authority, and the roles of patients emerge and change over time. “It also reveals society’s standards of what is considered normal.”

One example is Christoph Schlingensief’s Fluxus oratorio Eine Kirche der Angst vor dem Fremden in mir (A Church of Fear vs. the Alien Within). “In this work, the director confronted his own experience of lung cancer, combining personal experiences with religious and theatrical forms,” says Szymanski-Düll. The production demonstrates that illness is experienced not only as a medical diagnosis but is also shaped by biographical interpretations, fears, and cultural perceptions. “Autobiographical texts and performances are not direct records of lived experience, but interpretations mediated through artistic means. At the same time, Schlingensief’s work makes an individual experience of illness publicly visible and open to discussion.”

The idea of combining medical education with literature and the arts originated, in part, in the United States. Professor Maura Spiegel, co-founder of the Narrative Medicine Program at Columbia University in New York, was a visiting scholar at CAS in June. In a workshop, the literary scholar demonstrated how film analysis, reading texts, and reflective exercises can help develop observational skills, empathy, and interpretive abilities in medical education.

What can we learn from movies?

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Such approaches are also set to play a greater role in medical education at LMU Munich. “The particular aim is to encourage collaborative, interactive, and emotional learning through films,” explains psychiatrist and medical educator Dr. Mike Rüb, the third spokesperson for the Research Focus alongside Fischer and Szymanski-Düll.

This approach is based on the biopsychosocial model of health, which takes psychological and social factors into account alongside physical ones. “Students should learn that people perceive illnesses and treatment options differently and that these can affect individuals in different ways depending on their circumstances,” Rüb explains.

“For example, the prevailing public perception of electroconvulsive therapy, which is used to treat certain severe mental illnesses, is still strongly influenced by the 1975 film One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” says Rüb. “It is important to put such outdated, stigmatizing portrayals of a treatment into context during medical studies and, for example, explain to students how electroconvulsive therapy is performed today.”

For 20 years, M23 Cinema at LMU Munich’s Faculty of Medicine has provided a space for critically examining such portrayals. It screens films on medical topics, followed by discussions with experts and people directly affected by the issues presented. One film featured in the program was the documentary Lost in Face, in which a physician and neuroscientist portrays a young woman who is unable to recognize faces due to prosopagnosia.

M23 Cinema is one of several teaching and research initiatives at LMU Munich on which the new CAS Research Focus builds. Others include the Public Health Film Festival, which screens films exploring public health issues and encourages discussion, as well as a joint elective course for medical and art students who study human anatomy through life drawing.

Research, teaching, and public engagement

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CAS now aims to expand this collaboration to additional disciplines. Alongside medicine and theater studies, the participating fields include psychology, medical ethics, history, English studies, surgery, and public health. Together, the researchers intend to develop interdisciplinary projects. One of the central goals of the new Research Focus is to develop an interdisciplinary curriculum open to medical students as well as students in the participating humanities and social sciences.

Through a range of events, the new CAS Research Focus aims to promote academic exchange while also introducing its topics to a broader public. The symposium “Cinemeducation – Medicine Through Film and Narrative” (see information below) on 12 and 13 November will be followed later that month by a workshop on shame and migration, co-organized by Berenika Szymanski-Düll and accompanied by public readings and discussions. “Shame is ever-present in everyday medical practice,” says Mike Rüb, “but medical education currently offers too few opportunities to reflect on it.”

A lecture series is also planned for the summer semester of 2027, addressing topics such as dying in literature and medical themes in films from the Nazi era. A workshop in the winter semester of 2027/28 will examine how narratives influence professional identities and social perceptions, for example in interactions with people with ADHD.

One example that illustrates why it is worth critically examining such portrayals is Rain Man, starring Tom Cruise and Dustin Hoffman. Although the film brought autism to the attention of a wider audience, its exceptionally gifted main character also helped shape a one-sided image of people across the diverse autism spectrum.

Symposium „Cinemeducation – Medicine Through Film and Narrative“

The symposium “Cinemeducation – Medicine Through Film and Narrative” will take place at LMU Munich’s Center for Advanced Studies (CAS) on 12 and 13 November 2026. The event marks both the launch of the new CAS Research Focus “Narrations of Medicine” and the 20th anniversary of M23 Cinema at LMU Munich.

The symposium brings researchers together with professionals from the film and cultural sectors. Participants in the public opening panel on 12 November at 6:15 p.m. will include film director Caroline Link, Professor of Narrative Medicine Megan Milota from Utrecht University, and Julia Weigl, Artistic Director of the Munich Film Festival.

Further information and registration: Medicine Through Film and Narrative

Public events accompanying the workshop “Grammatik der Scham” (“Grammar of Shame”)

On Thursday, 19 November 2026, at 6 p.m., actor Dimitrij Schaad will perform a monologue from Yael Ronen’s play Sabotage. Necati Öziri will read from his novel Vatermal. Dramaturg Irina Szodruch will moderate the discussion that follows.

On Friday, 20 November 2026, at 4 p.m., author Daniela Dröscher will read from a recent text and engage in a discussion with the audience.

Both events will take place at the Center for Advanced Studies (CAS), Seestraße 13, München. Registration by email at info@cas.lmu.de is required.

MeCuMplus: M23-Kino