23/04/2026
🌞 "Ако не се наслаждавате на живота и нещата около вас, няма по-добър начин да похарчите парите си от това да отидете на терапия."
— От столицата на психоанализата 😉
“Psychoanalysis speaks about freedom and the line between what is permitted and forbidden, and the possibility of fulfilling our desires.” Absolutely fascinating programme about the history and development of psychoanalysis in Argentina, suggesting how therapy is always intrinsically “political” and social: the way the two threads of psychoanalysis and socio-political culture constantly interweave and emerge out of each other is here presented as both compelling, depressing, disturbing, moving, and ultimately inspiring.
"There’s a common joke in our profession", one Argentinian analyst notes, "that Argentina is very much like a personality disorder, we keep repeating the same patterns of behaviour, that have not been very successful in the past." It's a lovely line. And it makes you wonder what personality disorder Britain would be.
“With twice the number of psychotherapists per head than New York" Buenos Aires is apparently "the psychoanalytic capital of the world". Part of this success is the importance given in the culture to sanity: “Mental health is the most important thing in life. If you’re not enjoying life and things, there’s no better way to spend your money than going to therapy.”
It's also intriguing how psychoanalysis can vary according to different cultures - the documentary movingly suggests how the need for psychoanalysis here both emerged out of, and engaged with, the profound sense of melancholia, disruption, and loss that seems to have characterised much of Argentina culture in the twentieth century. “The actual effort of putting it into words is cathartic", one analysand poignantly remarks. "It’s like spitting it out. And I guess that’s what I feel cures you.”
Under Peron’s dictatorship, another observes, “psychoanalysis for us was more than just a psychological theory. In a way it was an intellectual pursuit that provided refuge from the reality of the time.”
Providing a space where these traumas, these repressions, these desires, can be heard and integrated, reveals the extraordinary, unique function that therapy can play in our societies. It was for this reason that James Hillman, the brilliant Jungian analyst, called the consulting room "the cell of revolution”.
To watch the film, please click here: https://vimeo.com/25026273?
