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Review: Horizon: How violent are you?

This gripping documentary may well shock you in its exploration of our capacity for violence
Michael Portillo takes on a local man in unarmed combat, as part of a Festival in Bolivia. This was Portillo's first physical fight, undertaken to test the theory that the hormones released during combat can be pleasurable
Michael Portillo takes on a local man in unarmed combat, as part of a Festival in Bolivia. This was Portillo’s first physical fight, undertaken to test the theory that the hormones released during combat can be pleasurable
(Image: <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk">BBC</a>)

– Documentary on BBC2 in the UK, currently scheduled for 5 May

AFTER 60 hours of little sleep, tending crying twins and trying to hold down a job, Michael is tense and becoming a bit paranoid.

Luckily for this seemingly unenviable fellow, he is in fact taking part in a TV experiment. He is , a former UK government minister, and the twins are lifelike dolls, built to be as inconsolable as real-life babies.

The programme is part of a BBC2 season on that perennially fascinating subject, violence. Portillo explores the extent to which each of us has the capacity for violent behaviour, by way of a Bolivian “mutual conflict festival”, interviews with a football thug and a boy soldier, and a restaging of Stanley Milgram’s “obedience” experiments of the 1960s.

It’s gripping, based on sound science, and for many viewers will be quite shocking. However, anyone acquainted with their own dark side will be left with more questions than answers.

Topics: Books and art

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