MY YEAR OF LIVING MINDFULLY

Featuring: Shannon Harvey, Neil Bailey, Amit Bernstein, Judson Brewer, Willoughby Britton, Vidyamala Burch, Nicholas Cherbuin, Richard Davidson, Gaelle Desbordes, Elissa Epel, Anna Finniss, Timothea Goddard, Daniel Goleman, Dan Harris, Craig Hassed, Amishi Jha, Willem Kuyken, Marc Longster, Kimina Lyall, Kristen Neff, Hilda Pickett, Matthieu Ricard, Mogoas Kidane Tewelde, Nicholas Van Dam, Marc Wilkins and Jon Kabat-Zinn.
Writers/Directors: Shannon Harvey and Julian Harvey.

Available to watch FREE at the My Year of Living Mindfully website until June 3. Also available for pre-order on digital and DVD.

Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★

“[Mindfulness is] the awareness that arises from paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally.” - Jon Kabat-Zinn, PhD; Professor Emeritus at University of Massachusetts. 

Undertaking a kind of Super Size Me for the psyche, journalist/filmmaker Shannon Harvey puts her body and mind on the line in the name of mental health science in My Year of Living Mindfully. Diving deep into the layered application of meditative practices as a healing tool, the award-winning health sector scribe chronicles just how effective centering her consciousness to combat physiological and psychological ailments can be.

A sequel-of-sorts to her 2014 mind-and-body doc The Connection, Harvey opens up about the growing toll that a combination of modern living (stress, insomnia) and ages-old afflictions (lupus) is having on her dangerously imbalanced inner-self. From that starting point, she begins her investigation of and complete immersion within the use of meditative mindfulness, seeking out the professors, practitioners and proven beneficiaries for whom the determined restructuring of one’s focus through concentration has been life-changing.

As a front-person for this journey of self-discovery, Harvey is an engaging protagonist, owning personal doubt in her ability to apply herself to the yearlong commitment and not hiding her own insecurities as her treatment demands introspection (husband and co-director Julian Harvey remains mostly off-screen, but admirably supportive). She also exhibits her award-winning skills as a journalist, with increasingly complex academic theorising from the many leaders in the field at her disposal presented with clarity.

The most profoundly human of the on-screen stories are those Harvey uncovers within her ‘case study’ subplots (of which she is the final subject). After many years as a warzone reporter and dealing with subsequent mental scars by self-medication, TV news presenter Dan Harris had an on-air breakdown in 2004; with her whole life ahead of her, Vidyamala Burch became a paraplegic after a car accident, aged just 24. Both relate the stark horrors their lives presented to them and the recovery process that eastern philosophies and meditative mindfulness inspired.

After 70-odd minutes of pristine hospital rooms, university halls and leafy Sydney surrounds (at one point, we accompany Harvey on a 10-day bush retreat), my nagging skepticism that ‘mindfulness’ was another wealthy white-person privilege grew louder. Almost on cue, Harvey addresses just such concerns with the production wisely shifting the third act to a Middle East refugee camp to gauge the impact of meditation on some of the most emotionally damaged humans on the planet. 

It is a decision that speaks to the deeply existential endeavour at the core of the mindfulness movement. While the science-based medical/sociological studies presented are fascinating and crucial to understanding meditative consciousness, My Year of Living Mindfully is ultimately about how effectively it has and can, with increasing knowledge of its benefits, serve all mankind in the face of the mental illness epidemic gripping the planet.

CRACKED UP

Featuring: Darrell Hammond.
Director: Michelle Esrick

DARRELL HAMMOND, director MICHELLE ESRICK and BESSEL VAN DER KOLK, author of the book 'The Body Keeps the Score' will be present for a live ZOOM Webinar on Monday May 4th at 4.00pm PST/7.00pm EDT, hosted by ACES CONNECTION founder Jane Stevens.
For further details and free registration, CLICK HERE. 

Available on:

Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★

For 14 years, Saturday Night Live star Darrell Hammond was the chameleon of late night comedy, the toast of political satire. His array of on-air impersonations, 118 in all by his own reckoning, mimicking the likes of Bill Clinton, Sean Connery and Al Gore, made him Lorne Michael’s go-to guy for big laughs and one of the series’ most celebrated cast members. 

As with many of the great comedic talents, Hammond’s talent was borne of hardship, as the comic himself chronicled in his 2011 memoir, ‘God, If You're Not Up There, I'm F*cked’. Director Michelle Esrick takes Hammond’s heartbreakingly open account of life as a survivor of child abuse and crafts a profile of an artist that goes far beyond what is expected of the ‘What makes comics tick?’ genre. Cracked Up is an artful, insightful, deeply thoughtful documentary that reveals not just how Hammond came to terms with his past but how it has helped him forge a new, meaningful direction that serves to heal fellow mental injury sufferers.

Framed by the ongoing evolution of his own creative process (the comic is rehearsing a one-man show with director Chris Ashley), Esrick’s camera follows Hammond as he returns to his childhood home in Wisteria Lane, Florida. In small increments, we learn of the extent to which the pre-teen Hammond was assaulted by his mother in a home he shared with a PTSD-suffering father. His first-person recollections of the abuse and his piecemeal memories of the attacks prove gruelling for both Hammond (who occasionally breaks down) and the audience, who should take heed that some of the details are particularly horrendous.

Cracked Up is a work that delicately balances the most profound aspects of Hammond’s suffering with the journey he underwent to recover from it. At the height of his fame on SNL, he was in the grip of self-medicating with dangerous levels of alcohol; his pain was so internalised, he would function as a performer even while cutting his own flesh, as many as 49 times. His suffering became so pronounced, friends such as SNL producers Lorne Michaels and Steve Higgins stepped in, leading to Hammond’s year-long stint in a mental health facility.

Esrick’s most compelling directorial ploy, aside from the forthright honesty she elicits from Hammond, is the plotting she employs based on the comic’s own colour-based impersonation methods (Porky Pig is yellow; Popeye is blue). Of the hundreds of voices in his head, none are represented by the colour red; the life-changing meaning behind this development and the healing moment it allows Hammond spins the film from the tragic trajectory of childhood trauma into the first steps of healing and acceptance.

For a man renowned for capturing the essence of other men, Darrell Hammond bares his scarred but healing soul like few ever have for the camera. He rarely falls back on his remarkable talent to paint over his pain and when he does, it is such a sadly bittersweet experience that it gives a fresh depth to the relationship he has with his gift. Cracked Up sheds Hammond of the barrier of celebrity he built up and hid behind for all of his adult life. 

Addressing a roomful of fellow mental health sufferers and trauma survivors, he is adored not for doing his ‘Bill Clinton’ but for revealing his ‘Darrell Hammond’. As the final frames of Michelle Esrick’s superb film reinforce, children are sharing the comic’s suffering in any house on any street right now. With Cracked Up, Hammond is only doing what he hoped someone might have done when he was a child - speaking up.