For a special holiday edition of Science on Screen, UNMC teams with Film Streams to raise a provocative question about the classic holiday film “Home Alone” — Is Kevin McCallister a psychopath?
The screening of the film will be at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Dec. 11, in the Ruth Sokolof Theater at Film Streams, 1340 Mike Fahey St.
Upon its release in 1990, the John Hughes-penned blockbuster was anointed into the canon of Christmas films. But with the distance of a few decades, “Home Alone” seems like a somewhat unlikely film to rally the family ’round.
When his neglectful family leaves him behind for Christmas vacation, the film’s hero, 8-year-old Kevin McCallister, experiences elation and discovers the solitude for which he’s always yearned. And when a duo of home invaders threaten his newly liberated living situation, Kevin methodically and ingeniously takes them out over a long, gruesome Christmas Eve.
UNMC’s Jonathon Sikorski, Ph.D., director of wellness education and assistant professor, UNMC Department of Psychiatry, and Kacie Baum, UNMC events and science outreach coordinator, will examine the possible pathology beneath those yuletide antics.