Raw Opium (2010)

Raw Opium is a feature length documentary (and two-part TV series) about a commodity that has tremendous power - both to ease pain and to destroy lives. The opium poppy is the raw material for heroin, fueling a vast criminal trade larger than the economies of many countries. Raw Opium is a journey around the world and through time, where conflicting forces do battle over the narcotic sap of the opium poppy. From an opium master in southeast Asia to a UN drug enforcement officer on the border of Afghanistan hunting down the smugglers of central Asia; from a former Indian government Drug Czar and opium farmer to a crusading Vancouver doctor and Portuguese street worker who daily confront the realities of drug addiction. We see how this flower has played, and continues to play, a pivotal role - not just in the lives of people who grow, manufacture and use it - but also in the increasingly tense sphere of international relations. In the process, our assumptions about addiction and the War on Drugs are challenged.