‘Seishin (Mental) – Kazuhiro Soda’

“To make a diamond shine, you need an even stronger diamond” says one of the patients of the Chorale Okayama Clinic, a Japanese centre for psychiatric care. He is referring to the actions and healing powers of a good doctor – of his doctor - on a suffering patient. The good doctor is Dr. Yamamoto Masatomo, not an ordinary professional or a typical psychiatrist; and the patient speaking, Sugano, with his poetry, his sensibility and his profound insights is no ordinary individual either.

According to the World Health Organization, in 2002, 154 million people around the world suffered from depression and 25 million from schizophrenia. More than 800,000 people die by suicide every year. Seishin observes the complex world of the Chorale Okayama outpatient mental health clinic in Japan, featuring scenes with patients, doctors, staff, volunteers, and home-helpers, in cinéma-vérité style. The film breaks a major taboo prevalent in Japanese society against discussing mental illness, and candidly captures the lives of people coping with suicidal tendencies, poverty, a sense of shame, apprehension, and fear of society.

(JP/US, 2008, 135’, OV, st EN