Ruben Terlou has made a sacrifice, paid a toll, a price. I could hardly escape that impression on Sunday, when I saw the first part of Doctor Ruben (VPRO). In the seven-part travel series, Terlou searches for sick people in seven countries. More than just the ailment, he immerses himself in the sickening circumstances of people; poverty, pollution, inequality, threat of war and violence. We know what he gave to it: his career as a doctor. He graduated with honors and had just started his PhD research (on leukemia) in 2014 when he was asked for the travel series Along the banks of the yangtze. The program resulted in a nomination for the Nipkow Disc – this was followed by two more series in and about China and for the program Along the new Silk Road From 2023 he traveled through the part of the world that was Russia’s and is becoming Asia’s.
In the introduction of Doctor Terlou he says that he doesn’t have the character to remain a doctor. “Too restless.” Meanwhile, we see him at home packing his bag for another long journey. To the United States, where his first ‘patients’ wait in the guise of serious criminals. The men – murderers, rapists, kidnappers – form a self-help group. Every week they meet in the prison of Vacaville, California to talk about their ‘disease’ under the guidance of ex-inmates. One in five prisoners worldwide is in an American prison. Crime seems to be a hereditary disease in parts of America, says Terlou.
One after another, the tough guy introduces himself in the self-help group with his name and state of mind. Richard feels “gratitude”, James feels “scared and vulnerable”, yet another is “grounded”. Men with muscles like cannonballs and skulls tattooed up to the top of their heads talk in a circle about their ‘losses’. About their mother who has been waiting for them for 31 years, their wives who no longer want to wait, their children to whom they can never be a father. I also expected a word about the losses of their victims and their families, but that may be something for another time.
Seasoned self-help client
Ruben Terlou may attend the sessions provided he participates. “Ruben, now you,” says the group. He makes a valiant effort by telling what he has been struggling with all his life, his “innate inability to stay.” He becomes gloomy and sad when he can’t leave, he says. At the same time, his urge to leave makes others sad. And that made me suspect that his doctor’s degree is not the only thing he has given up for his wandering life. He himself calls it his “obsession with freedom”. Quite harsh to say that to life prisoners, but they don’t lecture him about that. They stumble over the vagueness of his words and formulate a series of additional questions. What is he running from? What does he need but hasn’t gotten, not now or not ever? What is its poison and what is its medicine?
James, who stole his first line of coke from his mother when he was ten, turns out to be a seasoned self-help consumer. He is a dangerous person, he says. A childhood so full of addiction and neglect that he developed behavioral problems. “Like a rattlesnake, I warn those around me about my anger and aggression.” That’s how you do that. Terlou, visibly affected, stammers: “So we haven’t even started yet?” Hilarity everywhere. He has to look all the men in the eye for several minutes, fall back into their arms with his eyes closed, be lifted up by hands that you don’t want to know what else they did. For the next episode, Terlou traveled to Congo. No country too far, no price too high for a great program?