Documentary portrait of a rural Belarusian doctor.
Social & External
A documentary about the corrupt health care system in The United States whose main goal is to make profit even if it means losing people’s lives. "The more people you deny health insurance, the more money we make" is the business model for health care providers in America.
When Covid-19 hit New York City in 2020, filmmaker Matthew Heineman gained unique access to one of New York’s hardest-hit hospital systems. The resulting film focuses on the doctors, nurses, and patients on the frontlines during the “first wave” from March to June 2020. Their distinct storylines each serve as a microcosm to understand how the city persevered through the worst pandemic in a century
In the cobalt mining areas of Katanga in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), babies are being born with horrific birth defects. Scientists and doctors are finding increasing evidence of environmental pollution from industrial mining which, they believe, may be the cause of a range of malformations from cleft palate to some so serious the baby is stillborn. More than 60% of the world’s reserves of cobalt are in the DRC and this mineral is essential for the production of electric car batteries, which may be the key to reducing carbon emissions and to slowing climate change. In The Cost of Cobalt we meet the doctors treating the children affected and the scientists who are measuring the pollution. Cobalt may be part of the global solution to climate change, but is it right that Congo’s next generation pay the price with their health? Many are hoping that the more the world understands their plight, the more pressure will be put on the industry here to clean up its act.
Andrew Weil, M.D., program director of integrated medicine at the University of Arizona, teaches doctors and the public about nutrition, In this video, he describes good eating habits, nutritional health, and cooking. He also shares some cross-cultural perspectives on these fundamental topics.
One of America's best-known and most respected doctors offers a sensible approach to eating: He emphasizes enjoyment over deprivation, and long-term health benefits over short-term weight loss. Dr. Weil assures us that there is no confusion among nutrition experts about the optimal diet for health, body weight, and longevity. Understanding inflammation to be the root cause of many chronic illnesses, he gives science-based recommendations to help combat specific health concerns, all as part of an anti-inflammatory diet. On the subject of dietary supplements, he talks about what's perilous and what can help.
Phases of Matter follows living and inanimate residents of a teaching hospital in Istanbul, moving from the operating room to the morgue, between life and other states, the real and the virtual.
Diagnosis of gonorrhea should be done by clinical and laboratory investigation. The physician and patients are shown in the physician's office and examining room. The patients remove their clothing, and the physician takes samples from the end of the penis and makes thin smear slides from them. The techniques for stripping gonococci from male and female patients with chronic gonorrhea are shown in drawings and live footage. The physician is shown getting and preparing a urine sample for laboratory testing for the presence of gonococci, including using a hand-cranked centrifuge. The material is packaged to be sent away for laboratory diagnosis by gram stain and culture.
Despite the homeopathic doctors studying medicine, they treat their patients against the basis of scientific knowledge. Allegations of fraud surround the topic. In the film, homeopaths embark on adventurous explanations of their popular belief system.
A documentary film about Tibetan traditional medicine.
"Huangyangchuan, Gansu province, China. It's an arid mountain area with poor roads. Ma Bingcheng is well-respected local doctor, so many patients (most of them farmers) come to see him every day. In his small clinic, people chat with each other about their lives, local conditions, or the people they know. The clinic seems to open up like a microcosm, the information and experiences of different people intertwine, revealing the conditions of typical Chinese farmers, and the typical fates of both young and old--"
On November 7th, 2005, Sandra Smith died at the age of 47 taking 21 different medications. Now her son, Tabor Smith, vows to change the way America thinks about health. Amidst the ongoing opioid crisis, Tabor travels around the country to interview medical experts, political figures, and ordinary people in order to uncover the conspiracy behind America's drug-obsessed healthcare system - and most importantly, find out what can be done to change it. —Dr. Tabor Smith
Le serment d’Hippocrate follows the struggle of four immigrant doctors trying to find their place in the Quebec healthcare system. This film puts faces to the lives, journeys, and struggles of these unsung heroes who, nevertheless, had also taken the august Hippocratic Oath in their distant countries.
What is the purpose of our existence ? What is the soul ? Which are the power of mind, of conscience ? What is our link to nature ? Pondering these existential questions, this movie invites us to find out an universal wisdom, meeting shamans, healers, yogis, but also philosophers and doctors. From Mongolia plains to the Amazonian forest, it leads us far than we expected at first.
A historical documentary documenting the rise, function, and abandonment of a 17 story building that once housed The Rochester Psychiatric Center. This film tells the story of the building through historical footage, interviews of former staff and patients who recount their memories of the behemoth facility while also exploring the abandoned building as it is today.
DR Dokumentar has closely followed Svend Ling's everyday life, where he is contacted on a daily basis by people who want his help. Svend Lings publicly admits that he guides suicide with medicine, and he is, among other things, behind a suicide guide on the net and the 'Læger for active euthanasia' network, which fights for active euthanasia to be made legal in Denmark. In 2017, that openness led to him being stripped of his authorization as a doctor.
Dr. Carlos Cristos, 47, is terminally ill. He call a film director and proposes him to record his struggle for to live and die with dignity and without drama.
A reckoning of Nazi Germany’s planned execution of its own citizens with physical and mental disabilities whom they deemed useless to their society.
Unsettling medical details on the JFK assassination are disclosed by seven doctors who were in the ER during a futile effort to save his life in 1963.
In turn, the medical community has been affected by the post #metoo movement denouncing sexual violence against women. It was about time. Assaults and rapes perpetrated behind closed doors in doctors' offices have gone unpunished for too long. For a victim, reporting them is almost as difficult as recounting incidents of incest. And the medical councils, which are mainly made up of men, have long turned a deaf ear to patients' complaints. When cases are brought before the courts, the justice system also struggles to prosecute these rapists. Recently, practices and names have been made public, complaints are multiplying, and women are daring to speak out. Could this be the end of complacency towards these criminals in white coats?
This short documentary tells the story of the life and legacy of Dr. Susan La Flesche Picotte, an Omaha woman who became the first Native American physician.
A documentary about the life and films of director John Ford.
A purely observational non-fiction film that takes viewers into the ethically murky world of end-of-life decision making in a public hospital.
A documentary examining the decade of the 1970s as a turning point in American cinema. Some of today's best filmmakers interview the influential directors of that time.
Police pull over a woman who claims she just gave birth. But the baby — and the blood — aren't hers. Twisted lies unravel in this true-crime documentary.
A paralysingly beautiful documentary with a global vision—an odyssey through landscape and time—that attempts to capture the essence of life.
Through deeply personal interviews with her siblings and an examination of the photographs, letters, and belongings left behind, Mariska assembles a new portrait of her mother Jayne Mansfield, an extraordinary and complex woman.
In this documentary, recovering addict and amputee John Wood finds himself in a stranger-than-fiction battle to reclaim his mummified leg from Southern entrepreneur Shannon Whisnant, who found it in a grill he bought at an auction and believes it therefore to be his rightful property.
The film follows adventurer Jeff Johnson as he retraces the epic 1968 journey of his heroes Yvon Chouinard and Doug Tompkins to Patagonia.
In the Realms of the Unreal is a documentary about the reclusive Chicago-based artist Henry Darger. Henry Darger was so reclusive that when he died his neighbors were surprised to find a 15,145-page manuscript along with hundreds of paintings depicting The Story of the Vivian Girls, in What is Known as the Realms of the Unreal, of the Glodeco-Angelinnian War Storm, Cased by the Child Slave Rebellion.
Those who knew iconic funnyman John Candy best share his story, in their own words, through never-before-seen archival footage, imagery, and interviews.
Alexander McQueen's rags-to-riches story is a modern-day fairy tale, laced with the gothic. Mirroring the savage beauty, boldness and vivacity of his design, this documentary is an intimate revelation of McQueen's own world, both tortured and inspired, which celebrates a radical and mesmerizing genius of profound influence.
A love letter from a young mother to her daughter, the film tells the story of Waad al-Kateab’s life through five years of the uprising in Aleppo, Syria as she falls in love, gets married and gives birth to Sama, all while cataclysmic conflict rises around her. Her camera captures incredible stories of loss, laughter and survival as Waad wrestles with an impossible choice– whether or not to flee the city to protect her daughter’s life, when leaving means abandoning the struggle for freedom for which she has already sacrificed so much.
An astonishing journey revealing the awesome power of the natural world. Over the course of one single day, we track the sun from the highest mountains to the remotest islands to exotic jungles.
A visual montage portrait of our contemporary world dominated by globalized technology and violence.
After years in the limelight, Selena Gomez achieves unimaginable stardom. But just as she reaches a new peak, an unexpected turn pulls her into darkness. This uniquely raw and intimate documentary spans her six-year journey into a new light.
This character-driven film considers the evolving sex trafficking landscape as seen by the main players: the exploited, the pimps, the johns that fuel the business, and the cops who fight to stop it.
In the early-morning hours of July 23, 2007, in Cheshire, Conn., ex-convicts Steven Hayes and Joshua Komisarjevsky broke into the family home of William Petit, his wife, Jennifer, and their daughters, Michaela, 11, and Hayley, 17. Dr. Petit was beaten and tied to a pole in the basement. The three women were bound in their bedrooms while the men ransacked the house. The brutal ordeal continued throughout the morning, ending with rape, arson and a horrific triple homicide.
In a crime-plagued neighborhood near Miami, brutal, bare-knuckled backyard fights give young men a chance to earn money -- and self-respect.
SEDUCED AND ABANDONED combines acting legend Alec Baldwin with director James Toback as they lead us on a troublesome and often hilarious journey of raising financing for their next feature film. Moving from director to financier to star actor, the two players provide us with a unique look behind the curtain at the world's biggest and most glamourous film festival, shining a light on the bitter-sweet relationship filmmakers have with Cannes and the film business. Featuring insights from directors Martin Scorsese, 'Bernando Bertolucci' and Roman Polanski; actors Ryan Gosling and Jessica Chastain and a host of film distribution luminaries.
Bruce Conner’s most celebrated film for a reason: it takes historical moments that were replayed over and over on television—chilling repetition of Kennedy assassination coverage—and repurposes them into a meditation on how the media tries to exert authority and apply a sense of order to the anarchic. And though it may sound perverse to say so, the film is also—not incidentally—a thrill to watch. -- The A.V. Club