The Beautiful Truth
The Beautiful Truth
| 14 November 2008 (USA)
The Beautiful Truth Trailers

A troubled 15-year-old boy attempting to cope with the recent death of his mother sets out to research Dr. Max Gerson's claims of a diet that can cure cancer as his first assignment for home-schooling in this documentary from filmmaker Steve Kroschel (Avalanche, Dying to Have Known).

Reviews
boccult17

Crunchy kitten, I think you're a moron. First of all, since the beginning of man it has always been true that food is medicine, medicine is food. You ARE what you eat, duh! So, eat the most fresh, organic, living foods possible and nourish all the bodie's cells so that they are able to fully carry out the complex molecular processes needed for us to function each day. Of course there are billion dollar interests in propagating the current "way of medicine" which is clearly not working as Americans are getting SICK AND SICKER by the day, dying of myocardial infarctions left and right,and you're telling me that somehow our current "medicine" (i.e. shoving multiple synthetic drugs down peoples throats and feeding the IV sugar) is truly working? You must be blind and ignorant if you are going to in any way disagree with the genius of Dr. Max Gerson. I am going to be working in the area of nursing/medicine when I graduate shortly and I plan on working in an area that implements Gerson therapies and organic living as it is truly the only way to live; not only is this lifestyle conducive to one's own health but it is also conducive to a green environment. Unlike many of the people who attempt to discredit this man's work, I've actually taken a Biology course and know what I'm talking about :) :)

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VWFringe

If you are lucky enough to watch this film after reading any of these reviews, good for you. This film will expose you to a lot of Left-leaning prose, and a lot of scatter-shot facts about the controversy around the entangled business interests which have helped form our medical health system and practices, plus some other conspiracy theory stuff. If you like a good conspiracy theory you're gonna like this film. It's not trying to prove Gershon heals cancer, don't think of it like that. It's trying to build a logic cube in your head, let the facts flow in, then later start researching what you've heard, and don't stop when you find something you like, look for the other side too. After a while your mind can make new connections between the new information and what you're been taught. This stuff's too important to gloss over. It's important to learn new ways of thinking about things which incorporate more facts and more reality, and if you're only watching the narratives shown on TV, radio and news papers, you're not being exposed to the real controversies around our medical and pharmaceutical industries. Why would I want you to doubt the FDA is protecting you? because I found out about some of the controversy - it's not just one thing, and they're all important to know about. How else will we ever hope to demand our elected officials change it? Look for the Vanity Fair article called Dangerous Medicine. Some of the controversy is starting to be reported in mainstream media. Look to Democracy Now or the Huffington Post for more. Stick with it, get mad, don't withdraw from the hopelessness of it, stay mad, it helps with the petition signing you'll end up doing.

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crunchykitten

This film is blatant promotion of the rankest health quackery, an "alternative cancer therapy" that bilks hundreds of desperate people out of hundreds of thousands of dollars- then sends them home to drink carrot juice, squirt coffee up their bums, and die. This film was made to appeal to the least discriminating and most vulnerable members of society, in an attempt to get their money before they die and it's no longer in reach. The film offers no clinical evidence for the Gershon Therapy (there is none) and no credible science to support it. It's sad and scary and more than unfortunate- it's criminal. But it's not new. The same ridiculous garbage has been sold- at the highest possible prices- to a gullible public, under different names, for a long time.

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Daryl-7

This is a good movie to see for anyone even slightly open to alternative medicine / holistic health. It was interesting to hear the success stories of people who were saved by Gerson Therapy, which I don't doubt a bit (I know people who have survived cancer using similar means). However, I wish the film hadn't given the impression that --everyone-- gets better with Gerson, which of course isn't truth for any therapy.It surprises me that some people are still so hostile to the fact that changes in diet can change a diagnosis like cancer. If you think about how you got cancer in the first place (just coincidence??? just genetics??? C'mon...) then it is easier to think about diet as cause, complication and/or cure. I guess it will just take time for more people to come around.The movie was pretty well done. Very heavily biased towards the positive side of Gerson, very little airing of people dissenting against it, just a few seconds of those interviews, and unfortunately, focusing on guys like Stephen Barrett, who have been completely discredited in the medical field. I wish they would have had some good back-and-forth discussion on the pros and cons of Gerson without just throwing up a straw man like Barrett who is so easy to disparage. Unfortunately, stuff like Gerson Therapy tends to be a very emotional topic for Western medical specialists, so it must have been hard to find a person who could talk intelligently and somewhat calmly about it.The movie tries to make this a personal journey for this young man, as he discovers what is going on with Gerson Therapy and food as medicine. I think the movie was paced nicely and it wasn't too preachy. Overall, quite good. 8 stars out of 10

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