Methadonia (2005)

Most undeservingly overhyped movie of all time??

Did you people see the same film I saw?

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

This documentary follows some methadone patients around town. The majority are taking xanax along with their methadone which in most clinics will get you kicked off unless you have a prescription for yourself. But these fools make all methadone patients look like a bunch of junkies. I've been on methadone for the last 3.5 years and am almost tapered off completely due to all the stigma, dependency, observed ua's, money and plain hassle it's been. If someone wants to make a negative documentary about methadone than talk to people like me that followed the rules and have an issue not a bunch of whack jobs that are just there to get high.

Methadonia is a (excuse the pun) dip into the lives of several people trying to get over Methadone, which can be as addicting, sometimes even more so, then Heroin. They all go to a drop in for Meth addicts to get help trying to overcome Methadone. Apparently, it's damn hard to get off the stuff, and what's more shocking, the 'Methadone industry' will try damn hard to make sure you're addicted.I liked this film, all the characters in this were highly interesting, some were slightly crazy (like the gal who was having her 3rd kid, her first kids taken away from her). I mean, all in all I was rooting for some of these people, and some I was saying "Oh Dear".

Shown as an official selection at the New York Film Festival, September 2005.Negroponte used a DV camera to follow half a dozen New York City "recovering" heroin addicts on methadone maintenance. The point of the title is not a new one. It's that as a rehabilitation tool for drug addicts, methadone, which is just a drug substitute for heroin, isn't such a good idea. Its wide use in the US was initiated back in the Sixties as a transitional stage, but being itself a drug, it's little more than a not-so-great legal high for many addicts, who when on methadone, instead of getting clean are lingering in a netherworld "Methadonia." What we learn is that some of the users Negroponte filmed have been on the chemical for as long as three decades; that clinics are now doling out up to six times the original allowable dose; and that the street availability of benzo-pills like Xanax by which addicts can cheaply supplement and enhance the methadone high means many receiving methadone are not in recovery in any way shape or form. This is certainly important to be aware of. But what's otherwise lacking in Negroponte's pseudo-dramatic narration is any sophistication about the recovery process. The addicts are seen as members of a group, and their leader/counselor Millie, who has been clean for nine years, provides some hard truths, but since there's next to nothing about the Twelve Steps, or up to date rehab statistics or insights, it's hard to see this as anything but dumb as an account of the addiction, treatment, and recovery. Some of the addicts featured who showed up for the festival screening may have gotten motivation from seeing their stories filmed, but viewers of this limited and simplistic documentary are being shortchanged on information. This was definitely one of the NYFF's weakest selections, in my opinion the weakest. I am at a loss as to why it was chosen, other than the fact of its being strongly rooted in the New York City environment. I can only deduce that the the jury, which has such a keen eye for film-making quality, are lacking in sophistication about addiction and recovery and were fooled by the dramatic tone into thinking they were getting important new revelations, when when on the whole they were getting nothing of the kind.

HBO seems to be--pardon the pun--addicted to producing documentaries about drugs and drug addiction. From the sensationalistic and not terribly enlightening Crank: Made In America to the remarkable Dope Sick Love, Home Box Office can't seem to get enough of America's love affair with narcotics and other controlled substances. Thankfully, Methadonia is more than just another example of the pornography of despair, and serves to enlighten viewers about the Methadone experience and how recently developed psychotropics interact with it. The film focuses on a half dozen New York junkies over an 18 month period and their struggles with coping with not only their addictions to heroin and mood elevators but with the detox from Methadone itself. You'll gain a new appreciation for the hardships these folks live through, and the courage it takes for them to try to reclaim a normal life. Moving and uplifting, Methadonia is essential viewing for documentary fans.