Fifties psychiatry

The damaged psyche has long been attractive to film makers - consider Spellbound, or even Psycho. There was once more optimism and confidence about Freudian analysis, but this began to get whittled away, and by the late 50's there were clearly a lot of questions arising - does anyone actually ever get CURED? how should we balance the treatment of patients with their containment. Then along came R.D. Laing in 1960 with The Divided Self, which confirmed that psychosis was not only normal but justified by the overload of modernity/reality. This film is sketchy in its reflection on this debate. There are two doctors, a nice unconventional one who aspires to treat his patients, and the less nice one who sees his priority as containment. There's not much analysis of the options. Our hero, who seems pretty normal to me (a worrying sign in myself) is assigned to the bad doctor. The plot leaps forward through areas that it would be helpful to explore, while spending relatively large amounts of time watching him ride his motorbike. The lighting, camera work and music are good..