Some things just go well together.

Peanut butter and jelly, Sonny and Cher, Laurel and Hardy: these are just a few pairs that you can’t imagine having one without the other.

Thanks to a long-running film series held at Grand Valley State University, you can toss psychology and cinema into that very pile.

Entitled “Projection: The Psychology Film Series,” the world of psychology and the visual medium of film are blended once a week through special screenings of newer and classic films ranging from iconic classics like Quentin Tarantino’s “Pulp Fiction,” to lesser known gems like the 2007 film, “4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days.”

The inspiration for this series is not only intellectual, but also cultural, with regards to the campus of GVSU.

“When I got here, I noticed that there weren’t nearly as many ongoing cultural activities being offered on campus as I thought there would be,” said founder and GVSU professor Brian Bowdle. “Now, given that GVSU had pretty much seen itself as a commuter college until recently, this was understandable. But with more and more students living on or just off campus, I thought the time might be right to create something new and fun right here.”

Fans of any type of film will have their favorite genre portrayed during the series, as it’s a goal of Bowdle’s to vary the films that are screened each series.

“We’ve shown everything from spaghetti westerns to Japanese anime, with the occasional documentary or experimental film thrown in for good measure,” he said. “And we always try to cover a wide range of psychological topics – prejudice, dreaming, depression, memory, sexuality, and so on – with the movies we pick. There really isn’t any well-defined process we use when putting together each semester’s series. I guess we just aim for a sense of balance.”

However, the educational aspect of these films is also something that Bowdle hopes to focus on with this film series.

“Another one of the goals was to tie the film series to my academic discipline – psychology – by following each movie with an open-ended discussion of the movie’s psychological content,” he said. “ At first, I was a little worried that having to relate each film to a psychological issue would limit the kinds of films I could show, but this fear proved to be unfounded. After all, nearly every movie that’s ever been made is about people, and wherever there are people, you’re going to find a fair amount of psychology.”

This year’s series is as varied as they come.

Kicked off by Christopher Nolan’s 2010 hit film, “Inception,” the series is only three films in, with a total of nine films remaining. Screenings are held every Wednesday at 6 p.m., with the next screening held on February 16. The film being shown will be the 2007 Lee Isaac Chung film, “Munyurangabo.”

“I ultimately want this series to offer a variety of critically-acclaimed films that examine or illustrate important psychological issues and concepts, with each film followed by an open-ended discussion,” Bowdle said.

Films screen in Room 114 of Lake Michigan Hall.

[email protected]