Physician, Heal Thyself

Gabor Maté, a best-selling writer, social critic, physician, and expert on addiction, stress, and trauma offers a searingly intimate portrait of his own life. Maté begins with his traumatic childhood experiences in Budapest during and after the Holocaust. Once his family immigrated to Canada, Maté developed a complicated relationship to his Jewish identity and Zionism, becoming a student activist, columnist, and teacher, before entering medical school and ultimately serving patients in harm reduction clinics in downtown Vancouver. With unflinching honesty, this contemporary icon unpacks the narratives he inherited and told himself, stresses the importance of self-awareness, and struggles to manage his painful past. As a life-long contrarian, Maté played an important role in breaking social stigmas around a wide range of subjects from ADHD to ayahuasca, the South American psychoactive brew, traditionally used by Indigenous folk healers for spiritual ceremonies. Featuring wonderful animations, archival photographs, and home movies, this documentary captures the person best described as “the eye of the tornado.” — Thaïs Miller

United States Premiere

Over the past 15 years, Asher Penn has conducted, edited and published over 150 interviews with cultural figures ranging from William Gibson to Grimes. He is the producer of the experimental documentary Maggie Lee’s Mommy. Physician: Heal Thyself is his first feature film.