The first in a three-part series produced by PBS about the life and work of great thinker and psychiatrist Carl Gustav Jung. The first section outlines Jung’s most important contributions during his long career. Born in Switzerland on July 26, 1875, Jung became interested in psychiatry while studying medicine.
He saw similar content in the minds of deranged people, most of which he recognized from his own inner life, and which he described in his autobiography Memories, Dreams, Reflections. His lifelong quest to understand the workings of the mind led him to develop analytical methods in psychiatry.
He went on to consider the role of what he called the individual and collective unconscious in the lives of his patients, as expressed in dreams, myths, and external events. Through film excerpts, photographs and interviews with some of his colleagues and Jung himself, the story of one of the most important figures of the 20th century is told.
Inheritance of Dreams tells the story of collective myths shared by different cultures and races around the world. Jung saw this as evidence of underlying unifying principles in the human psyche, which he called archetypes. These archetypes exist in the collective unconscious and are expressed to the individual in dreams and synchronous events.
The film examines some archetypal symbols in world mythology. Jungian analyst John Beebe used the science fiction film Star Wars to illustrate the presence of ancient myths in today’s symbolic expressions. There are few shots of Jung traveling to Africa, England, and New Mexico in search of archetypal themes.
The third section examines some interesting archetypal images expressed in modern images. The film takes viewers to a variety of sources, from AA movies and sci-fi movies to modern architecture and the stock market.
Interviews with Jungian analysts including Aniela Jaffe, Jane Wheelwright, James Hillman, and Adolf Guggenbuhl-Craig. Dr. Harry Wilmer shares his writing on Vietnam Veterans’ dreams and “healing nightmares.” New Age philosophy and the infamous discussions of Alfred Hitchcock’s films relate to Jungian psychology.
