Edition 24: 1–9 August, 2025

4. Addiction and Control

Methadone: An American Way of Dealing

United States
1974 — 60' / Black & White

1

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Synopsis

Methadone: An American Way of Dealing, about how the rise in heroin addiction was typically addressed in the early 1970s, unfortunately remains very relevant today. Set in Dayton, Ohio, Methadone captures how social services, designed to help, in fact often neutralize those they intend to serve, as professionals treat social problems as mental illness or personal weakness. It is a sobering testament about what can happen to those unable to buy into the American Dream.

Director Biography

Julia Reichert (June 16, 1946 – December 1, 2022) is an Academy Award winning Ohio based documentary filmmaker, whose films include 9to5 – The Story of a Movement, American Factory 美国工厂, A Lion in the House, The Last Truck, Seeing Red, Union Maids, Growing Up Female and the currently untitled Dave Chappelle Documentary which premiered at Tribeca Film festival in Radio City Music Hall. Jim Klein has been an active member of the independent film movement since the early 1970s. He is a founder of the pioneering film distribution co-operative New Day Films and active in the filmmaker organizations that shaped the field. With partner Julia Reichert, he created such innovative documentaries as Growing Up Female, the first documentary about women from a feminist perspective, which was selected for the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress; Academy Award nominee Union Maids, one of the first oral history films; and Academy Award nominee Seeing Red, a challenging film about American communists.

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Director

Jim Klein

Julia Reichert

Producer

Jim Klein

Julia Reichert

Cinematographer

Alicia Weber

Editor

Jim Klein

Julia Reichert