By Alex Strachan, Canwest News ServiceSeptember 7, 2009
http://www.canada.com/Fine+Tuning+Monday+Sept/1969338/story.html
Labour Day is often a day for taking stock of the good things in life, but in the tiny Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan, taking stock of life - in a good way - has become a national passion. At least, that's the pleasing picture presented by the VisionTV documentary Developing Happiness.
Developing Happiness, from Montreal filmmakers Tanya Ballantyne Tree and Josephine Mackay, makes its Canadian TV debut today, on a day when many people are thinking of the work year, and school year, to come.
The ideas in Developing Happiness may strike some as so much crackpot thinking, but others may be apt to find it food for the soul. Either way, the program offers a refreshing change in tone from the usual reality-TV message of outwit, outplay and outlast.
According to Developing Happiness, the Bhutanese believe a society's true value is measured by its GNH, or Gross National Happiness. Bhutan's government applies the philosophy to almost everything it does. Bhutan's Prime Minister Jigme Thinley has said things like, ``Happiness is complete well-being . . . being content with what is and with what one has.''
While that may sound like the underpinnings of a national cult - there's that homegrown Western cynicism again - as Ballantyne Tree and Mackay's program shows, some Western economists and environmentalists are growing increasingly interested in the idea that ``the pursuit of happiness'' as a national ideal can actually lead to tangible results, both economic and social. People who are spiritually happy are certainly less hard on the environment than people who are consumed by the drive to get ahead.
Developing Happiness is not the first program to document Bhutan's live-and- let-live life philosophy. Earlier this year, Michael J. Fox, still wrestling with the effects of Parkinson's disease, journeyed to Bhutan for a spiritual balm in his heartwarming ABC documentary Adventures of an Incurable Optimist.
Developing Happiness shares Fox's sense of incurable optimism.
You don't have to buy into the concept of spiritual enlightenment to enjoy the program: A live, beating heart and a curiosity about the world will do. Recommended. (VisionTV, 10 ET/7 PT)
Three to see
* The Aussie cult soap McLeod's Daughters returns for its final episodes, starting tonight, giving fans a chance to prepare a fond farewell for favourite characters like Stevie (Simmone Jade Mackinnon) and Grace (Abi Tucker). McLeod's Daughters is more than Wild Roses for the Outback set: This relationship saga about strong-willed women taming the Australian ranch lands was one of that country's longest-running, most-watched dramas. (VisionTV, 9 ET/ 6 PT)
* PBS's entertaining History Detectives, a kind of Antiques Roadshow meets CSI, calls it a season with tonight's outing, in which the show's resident sleuths examine a penny stamp's connection to the landmark Scottsboro Boys civil rights case in 1931; determine whether an accidentally discovered box of sheet music contains the original notes for Duke Ellington's classic Take the A Train; and decide whether a key moment in U.S. Civil War history needs to be rewritten. Better not tell Ken Burns. (PBS, 9 ET/PT)
* Space concludes its Labour Day weekend marathon of Star Trek movies with the so-called Next Generation collection, beginning with 1994's Generations - Capt. Picard and Capt. Kirk together! Or in the same two-hour movie, at any rate - and ending with 2002's Star Trek Nemesis, in which Capt. Picard faces his evil twin, a power-hungry Romulan dude looking to take over the universe. Ah, nostalgia. (Space, from 4:40 ET/1:40 PT)
astrachan@canwest.com
blog: www.canada.com/tvguy
© Copyright (c) Canwest News Service
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