Emmanuel Itier

THE END OF MEDICINE

With: filmmaker Alex Lockwood and Dr. Alice Brough

Interview by Emmanuel Itier

‘The End of Medicine’ (AppleTV/iTunes! Link can be found here: https://apple.co/3JoE0Zz} could very much be the last documentary made as a cautionary tale to explain the dangers and the exploitation of animal raised for your “stomachs”. It’s a vivid and alarming exposé about the many advantages of removing animals from your diet. As a growing older man, a French man that is, I’m not yet ready to totally give up on such eating habits but I’m willing to get educated and to reduce my “food” print in this destructive domino effect caused by our society, therefore: me, myself and we. Together, quickly, we need to evolve in the right direction and re-invent ourselves if we want to thrive and build a sustainable planet for a healthier humanity. “Chapeau!” to the team of filmmakers of “The end of medicine” and pay attention to what they have to share with you. Let’s begin…

Q: Tell me about your motivations and inspirations to put together such an inspiring documentary?

Alex: I got approached by Keagan Koon had an idea about this subject matter and I was intrigued about it. So, I did some research, and I couldn’t believe what I found and how serious this stuff is. This is not common knowledge and it’s not put out there for everybody to know about it. I was very anxious about making this film in order to share this information with everyone.

Alice: On my side I had a very strong urge to share this message with everyone. I have been working in this environment for years and I was very concerned about exposing these thoughts. This project came at the right time. It came alongside a legal case I’m taking to the UK government about the risks taken from animal farming and the way we inter-act with animals.

Q: What type of challenges did you face making this film?

Alex: It’s a film about how treatments of animals have an intrinsic link with things like a pandemic, animal cruelty and chronic disease. We started this film talking about pandemics and an actual pandemic happened, covid 19. This was going to be an alarmist movie and it became something more since we had to react to an ongoing current affair facing a real pandemic. The scope of the film had to change somewhat because we are dealing with something which is actually happening. We are not talking about something that might happen in the future. With this pandemic came some types of limitations with filming such a movie. I couldn’t go and film everything I wanted to film. I wanted to go all around the world, and we were not able to do it entirely the way I wanted to film it, but we were able to film enough footage I needed for this film, in the end.

Alice: I spoke so much about various things that it was impossible to put it all in this film. I think this was a challenge to find out what to keep, of my talks, for the final cut of the movie. I can talk hours about any of the issues related in this film. The challenge was to make sure that the key messages came through this film and that the audience is paying attention about these issues.

Q: How did you get Joaquin Phoenix involved with this film?

Alex: By pure coincidence, his wife and Joaquin had in mind to make a film about this subject. They heard about what we were doing, and they asked us to join forces as it made more sense to do so. They were incredible and so supportive. They came up with lots of ideas and suggestions about what topics to cover. Even with the edit, they offered us many thoughts and they were so inclusive of our own approach about the movie. It was a dream to have Joaquin and his wife on-board.

Q: Can a movie like this help with the conversation. Is this a tool of education, a cautionary tale? What impact do you hope this film has?

Alex: Documentaries like this have an enormous impact to inspire people. Our film and other are instrumental about changing the conversation, whether they are about environmentalism, veganism, and many other issues. It’s an easily digestible movie on top of being entertaining. It’s better than reading lots of books about it and making lots of research, as I did. I hope this makes people look at themselves and at these issues. I hope people get a sense where their food comes from and the problems that are coming about as a result of that. I hope we have an impact on their decisions as consumers.

Alice: It is, indeed, a little bit of a cautionary tale for me. It seems like all the catastrophes we can face are coming at us as one: pandemic, climate crisis, etc. So, I think, we need to move away from an economy and a food system that is based on exploitation, of the planet, of animals and of other people. I think this is quite well encapsulated in the movie. I hope that what people take away from our film is that these issues have been fully ignored, for years, by governments and big corporations. But, with our wallets, as consumers we can take control of this situation. I hope this is quite empowering as well as informative to makes some changes ourselves and build a different future that we all want.

Q: Did this movie transform you in any ways? Did you learn something you didn’t know about this subject matter?

Alex: I, actually, had no idea about this subject matter. I was vegan before making this film and this picture has reaffirmed my decision to become vegan. It has also pushed me to make more films around this topic as more issues need to be addressed. What I learned making this film is that it’s quite scary what we are talking about in this movie but it’s also great to realize we can do something about these things. It doesn’t have to be all gloom and doom. For me, the take- away is that there is Hope to change our habits and change the world.

Alice: Yes, it did transform me and educate me as I had to do so much research and there are so many new data about these subjects. For example, when we started the movie there were 700,000 people dying, a year, from antimicrobial resistance and now it’s up to 5,000,000 a year! It’s so massive. Before this film I was already alarmed about this situation but now I’m even more alarmed. And O hope people will be, as well.