I think with movies I am really connecting to the Joseph Campbell idea of the collective unconscious.

Smith is describing his sense that popular films can tap into shared, cross-cultural story patterns—what he attributes to Joseph Campbell’s ideas about mythic archetypes and a common psychological reservoir. In this view, a movie succeeds not only through spectacle or star power but by activating familiar narrative structures (the hero’s journey, trials, transformation) that audiences intuitively recognize. The remark also frames Smith’s acting and project choices as an attempt to “connect” at a deeper level than entertainment: to participate in modern mythmaking that resonates widely. Even if Campbell’s terminology is imprecisely invoked, the core claim is about cinema’s ability to reach collective, universal emotional meanings.