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Stairway to Light

9 votes

This John Nesbitt's Passing Parade short tells the story of 18th Century French physician Dr. Philippe Pinel, who initiated enlightened, humane treatment of the mentally ill.

Status: Released

Released Date: 1945-11-03

Runtime: 10 mins

Director: Sammy Lee

Spoken language: English

Genres: Drama, History

Original title: Stairway to Light

Production Companies: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

Production Countries: United States of America

Cast

Narrator (voice)

John Nesbitt

Head Keeper (uncredited)

Dewey Robinson

Hector Chevigny (uncredited)

Gene Roth

Keeper Hosing Down Patient (uncredited)

Harry Wilson

Dr. Philippe Pinel (uncredited)

Wolfgang Zilzer

Reviews

Geronimo1967

The unassuming Philippe Pinel (Wolfgang Zilzer) takes up a position in charge of a prison for the mentally ill in Paris and is horrified by what he discovers. There are people, unkempt and uncared for, who have been kept in the dark, chained to walls and fed a diet of gruel, bread and water - and they have been there for decades. Rather courageously, he concludes that chains and pain have never “cured” anyone so he determines to release some of these people back into society. Now there is an understandable scepticism from the public at large as none of those freed are tracked or monitored and so could easily revert to their violent ways, so they turn on this man as he walks to work. It’s going to take a somewhat miraculous intervention if he is to survive to prove the merits of his strategy. It’s far too short a feature to really develop the story of this visionary fellow here, but the monochrome and menacingly scored photography does raise heckles as we come to terms with the out of sight out of mind attitude that prevailed across so-called civilised society as late as the 18th century.

2025-07-06

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