The Show Must Go On

Weg vom Fenster - Leben nach dem Burnout

This PBS documentary explores depression, a debilitating disease that affects millions of Americans. Touching the lives of people from diverse backgrounds, depression still carries a stigma that causes some sufferers to go without treatment. Real people with depression talk about their experiences, and scientists offer commentary to shed light on the disease, including its diagnosis, treatment and current research.

Outsourcing Greenville is the story of what happened when the world's largest refrigerator plant outsourced to Mexico leaving 1/4th of Greenville, Michigan residents unemployed. The factory had been a fixture of the Greenville community for over 100 years until Electrolux uprooted the plant in March of 2006 to move production to Mexico where they could pay workers wages as low as $1.57/hour. This story is told through the voices of employees and the president of their union as they attempt to face the future in a season of difficulty and change.

With the energy of the dying, those in power apply themselves to reasserting the value of work – with force, if need be. But more and more workers have understood that, to truly value their work, they have to do without it. They also have to get rid of the society of consumption that goes along with it. It may not be easy, but it is certainly amusing. We present a panorama of a mass desertion destined to spread.

Out of Sight takes a close look at how our society treats adolescents at-risk of suicide, or suffering from depression - and its dire consequences. It addresses the idea that such issues are best kept "out of sight."

Dépression, de l'ombre à la lumière

A short form exploration of the very visceral and disorienting world of living with severe anxiety and depression, the world’s biggest health problem.

Jonas Elrod woke up one day with the ability to see and hear angels, demons and ghosts. Filmed over the course of three years, this documentary follows Jonas and his girlfriend as they try to understand the phenomenon.

A documentary about the closure of General Motors' plant at Flint, Michigan, which resulted in the loss of 30,000 jobs. Details the attempts of filmmaker Michael Moore to get an interview with GM CEO Roger Smith.

"You are suffering from a mental fragility,” the doctor tells Ahang as she desperately tries to understand why she sometimes feels so terribly sad, as though everything has fallen apart. From the outside, she seems to live a sound and good life. For periods of time everything feels really good. But then it hits her: that horrific panic and despair that destroys everything and presses her down into a deep black hole.

Facing exorbitant fees for sessions with his therapist, Rodrigo Muñoz finds a great economical use of resources in this self–dramatization which portrays the account of his depression. In confronting the pecuniary dimension of the day-to-day, Rodrigo ironically seizes upon film as a process of emancipation.

By following the lives of five Japanese individuals this documentary explores the problem of depression in Japan and how the marketing of anti-depressant drugs has changed the way the Japanese view depression. Marketing of anti-depressants did not begin in Japan until the late 1990s and prior to this, depression was not widely recognized as a problem by the Japanese public. Since then, use of anti-depressants has sky-rocketed and use of the Japanese word "utsu" to describe depression has become commonplace, having previously been used only by psychiatric professionals.

Japan’s obsession with cutesy culture has taken a dark turn, with schoolgirls now offering themselves for “walking dates” with adult men. Last year the US State Department, in its annual report on human trafficking, flagged so-called joshi-kosei osanpo dates (Japanese for “high school walking”) as fronts for commercial sex run by sophisticated criminal networks.

A documentary crew films a young man, whose eyebrow started thinning a year ago, trying to reflect on everything in his life as he is having traumatic day to day experiences in which he is a victim of social exclusion.

Due to the measures taken by the government, students have fewer and fewer prospects for a meaningful future. Life is on pause and society is kept in fear. The confidence in a bright future is gone. Even after 18 months, there is still no light at the end of the tunnel. The many promises have not yet changed this situation. In this moving documentary, young people give an idea of the impact of the measures on their lives. Is there still hope or has the damage already been done?

Filmmaker Paul Gallasch is 30 and still lives at home with his mentally ill mother. When he meets the woman of his dreams, Paul decides that if he's ever going to make a new life of his own, he must first find a cure for his mother's illness.

A free-flowing, poetic short film filled with expressionist imagery, old photos and abstract moments, led by a voice-over in which the director tells us personal memories of his youth and his recent life in the hopes of sketching a clear image of the complex struggle of growing from an innocent child to a weary adult.

THE SCIENCE OF TAPPING is a collection of videos about the practice of Emotional Freedom Techniques (or "tapping"). Tapping techniques are interventions that apply principles of Chinese medicine for self-regulation — especially for the relief of chronic stress, anxiety, or pain. Interviewees discuss the evidence basis for the benefits of manually percussing some associated acupuncture points.

Four people suffering from various forms of clinical anxiety disorders tell us what it's like to live and work with this illness. They discuss the stigma attached to being anxious, and also how to cope with the symptoms using things like medication, supplements, self love and meditation. All of this in an endless search for anxiety relief.

A historical perspective to understand Neoliberalism and to understand why this ideology today so profoundly influences the choices of our governments and our lives.