Instructional and Entertaining Films On Mental Illness From Psychiatrist/Mystery Writer/Director

May 24, 2012 - PRLog -- The 54 minute documentary, Schizophrenia in Focus, explores the very nature of schizophrenia using excerpts from psychiatrist David Laing Dawson's previous writings and films, dramatizations and first person accounts, as well as an interview with Dr Richard O'Reilly, a professor of psychiatry at the University of  Western Ontario. The title is from an academic book Schizophrenia in Focus: guidelines for treatment and rehabilitation by David F.L. Dawson, Heather Munroe Blum, and Giampiero Bartolucci, published by Human Sciences Press, New York, 1983.

Dawson was formerly a Professor of Psychiatry at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada and Psychiatrist-in-Chief at the Hamilton Psychiatric Hospital. He now works part-time in clinical psychiatry, primarily with families, children, and adolescents while devoting the rest of his time to teaching, writing, film making, and painting.

Schizophrenia in Focus is now available for the first time.

Dawson's previous films, also available via http://www.cuttingforstone.com are:

1. The Brush, The Pen and Discovery - a 33 minute documentary of the Cottage Studio in Hamilton Ontario, Canada. The studio is a place for those with schizophrenia to go to paint. The artists at the Cottage Studio had the opportunity to prepare for and hang a show of their work at an opening at the Gallery on the Bay in Hamilton at the end of June 2009.

The documentary deals with their preparation for the show, the show itself, and in-depth  interviews with three of the artists. While the story is about the preparation for a serious gallery opening for these artists culminating in the opening itself, the interviews  explore the very issue of schizophrenia, the lives of the people it affects and the role of artistic expression in their recovery.

The Brush premiered at a special screening hosted by St Joseph's Health Care in Hamilton, Ontario and has been screened at the Canadian Psychiatric Association annual meeting, the annual conference of the Canadian Mental Health Association, at Movie Monday in Victoria, BC and at various other venues. It was selected for screening at the international virtual documentary film festival Culture Unplugged.

Dr. Peter Cook, Head of Service Schizophrenia & Community Integration Service St. Joseph's Healthcare Hamilton, On, Canada and Associate Clinical Professor, Department of Psychiatry & Neurobehavioral Sciences, McMaster University said:

"I loved this film. Without shying away from the realities of having a serious and persistent mental illness, three courageous people talk of their struggles, their dreams and their hope. Educational, accurate, human, and compelling."

2 My Name is Walter James Cross is a 53 minute docudrama of Walter who had decided to kill himself and failed, so he decided to tell his story instead. Finding an abandoned theater, he stands on the stage alone and recounts his descent into mental illness, into schizophrenia. This is a compelling dramatic monologue presenting an accurate depiction of a devastating, costly, much maligned, and misunderstood illness.

It has been screened at the Rendezvous With Madness Film Festival in Toronto, both the American and Canadian Psychiatric Association Annual Conferences, on TV Ontario and has been well received by doctors and nurses as well as patients and their families.

3. Cutting For Stone is a full length feature film about a young man developing schizophrenia and his attempts (along with those of his family and friends) to deal with the changes happening to him. An engrossing thriller that is also an accurate and honest depiction of mental illness. It stars Domenic Zamprogna (General Hospital, Battlestar Gallactica and more), and Kathleen Munroe (CSI New York, Without A Trace).

Critics have called it "riveting" and "a far truer and rawer depiction of schizophrenia than you have seen before."

Cutting For Stone premiered at the Montreal Film Festival as Drummer Boy and received a Chris Award at the Columbus International Film and Video Festival.

All films are available at Cuttingforstone.com with links to Createspace to purchase.

For a deeper understanding of schizophrenia from different perspectives to supplement these films, are the books by http://www.bridgeross.com.  These are:

Schizophrenia Medicine's Mystery Society's Shame by Marvin Ross and recommended by the World Fellowship For Schizophrenia and Allied Disorders
After Her Brain Broke: Helping My Daughter Recover Her Sanity by Susan Inman and recommended by the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) in the US, EUFAMI in Europe and the Mood Disorders Society of Canada.
My Schizophrenic Life: The Road To Recovery From Mental Illness by Sandra Yuen MacKay and recommended by NAMI and Mood Disorders Society of Canada
What A Life Can Be: One Therapist's Take on Schizo-Affective Disorder by Carolyn Dobbins PhD and recommended by NAMI
When Quietness Came: A Neuroscientist's Personal Journey With Schizophrenia by Erin L Hawkes - released May 2012

The trailer for Schizophrenia in Focus is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCzlarBnM2U&feature=related