Disability Now – Paul Darke

November 1999 TV Review

Channel 4’s Deaf Century (Oct. 2, 9 and 16), trailed last month in this column, was as bad as it was controversial. Made by a non-deaf production company/crew who were subsequently given the cold shoulder by most deaf activists (who took C4’s decision to commission the non-deaf saying that deaf film-makers did not have the ability to deliver), it showed the deaf activists to be more astute that at first glance. The series was badly written, lacking in insight, wit or intelligence. The series was, put simply, embarrassing – it made the Disability Century look brilliant in comparison. It did not even have open-subtitles (but then would Channel 4 have any idea why that should have been the case!).

Living Proof: Rachel’s Brain (BBC1, Sept. 21) was not a lot better. Supposedly a serious documentary it was in fact a sycophantic advert for the medical profession as considerate lobotomists. Rachel, a young girl who has half her brain removed, was being cured of her epilepsy. Significantly, I am not against the actual realities of the programme. What was criminal was the lack of information about the results of the operation. It was crass, insidious and evil programme.

Clive Anderson All Talk (BBC1, Sept. 23) continues to epitomise all that is banal in popular culture. A potentially interesting interview with Kirk Douglas, the first I have him give since his stroke, was reduced to vacuous platitudes that would not have seemed out of place in a book of common clichés. A similarly wasted opportunity was Ian Dury “On My Life” (BBC2, Sept. 25); it had its moments but considering it might be one of the final major documentaries about Ian Dury – a legendary figure in disability circles – it lacked a desire to get beyond the media interview to get the real Ian Dury.

From the Edge (BBC2, Tuesday evenings) has a set of new, better, opening titles but I can’t tell you if the closing titles were new; the programme is so badly made and incoherent in what it is trying to say that I had to switch it off before the end.

Although Channel 5 does not often do disability, apart from the occassional ‘blind woman wants sex’ porno story, Without Pity (c5, Oct. 11) was very much about disability. A one hour documentary narrated by Christopher Reeve it looked at the lives of ‘the largest minority group in the USA: people with disabilities’. It focused upon the lives of a few individuals who were very physically dependent in order to have lots of urine bag shots and men and women being cleaned and dried. It was very voyeuristic but at least it ended with a bit about ADAPT, the American activist group, demonstrating for equal rights.

Look out in November on Channel 4 for a ‘disease of the week’ drama called Kid in the Corner about Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder; and a Cutting Edge documentary called Love Is Blind about the loss of a sense.

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