Lawrence postulates that war acts as a Winnicottian "holding environment" in Stephen Spielberg's film, Empire of the Sun. To master psychic trauma, the protagonist, Jaime, utilizes past identifications, innate endowment, and capacity for play. Through the developmental tasks of latency, he is able to transform his experience in a japanese detention camp. "Within the context of such a holding environment, the industriousness … of latency bolsters the ego's capacity to resist regression."