Bukovsky

Bukovsky is a precious document on the history of how psychiatry was misused as a tool of political repression in the USSR of the 1970s and how that abuse was responded to in the West. It is a miracle that the film survives as it was shelved by the BBC and elements were left to neglect.

While the focus is on the prominent dissident of the title, the discussion brings out two strong general points.

First, the shameful way fellow psychiatrists around the world, aware of the abuse of their profession, chose not to speak out so as not to offend their colleagues who they would be meeting at conferences such as one in Mexico City in 1972, where they would schmooze and act polite and say nothing.

Second, the way the British media generally felt the story of Soviet dissidents and psychiatry was "boring" so decided to give it little coverage. But then when Bukovsky became a celebrity the media, as Clarke shows us, would not give the man a moment's peace but hover over him even as he attempts to eat a meal.