“American Pain”: Film Review | Tribute 2022

Attention Readers: Do You Suffer From Anger Deficit Disorder? Do you find it difficult to maintain a level of anger commensurate with the horrors that plague this world? We name Darren Foster’s Pill Factory Doctor american pain, a film that is difficult to argue with using civic language, is filled with some of the most hated Americans who are currently not involved in politics or technology. Caution: Do not watch on a full stomach or while driving and plan after a very relaxing viewing.

Foster’s film features twin brothers Chris and Jeff George, red-haired fellow Sacklers and others who amassed wealth during the opiate crisis. Imagine racist jeeps running loose in Florida and you can see their faces. If someone is interested in overdose in the 2000s, it is very likely that the drugs they are given will be delivered to them at one of the specious painkiller clinics. In the words of one of the federal agents interviewed here, they ran “the largest street group operating in the entire United States.”

Take shocking time-lapse surveillance footage of one of brother-in-law’s pills, where a crowd of drug addicts waiting to get in looks like ants spoiling a sugar cube. Corrupt doctors carry guns under their coats; MRI machines operating behind strip clubs; Garbage bags full of money. If the trade doesn’t ruin so many lives, you can call it a flush. But despite its fast pace and loose material, Foster is conscientious enough to make George’s story fun.

Much of the children’s story comes here in an interview with their father, John Paul George. (Somewhere, Ringo Starr thanks heavens he’s not associated with this squad.) The house builder, who built the polluted residences of the rich, raised some fears: Which led to some serious consequences. Everything we understand suggests that your father taught you this: you are a smart, stupid cop, do what you want and fuck everyone. He might not say this directly, but when he talks about his twin crimes, it’s hard not to see the pride he shows in the scale of his criminal accomplishments.

Hockey enthusiasts who have long valued easy access to steroids, the brothers founded South Beach Rejuvenation, which acted as “steroid telemedicine.” Then they met a doctor who turned a blind eye to the painkiller clinic business: especially in Florida, which had no similar prescriptions to track in the database (and seemed to give virtually anyone the right to sell prescription drugs). ), there were analgesic trade clinics. Gold mine for unscrupulous operators. This doctor died a few weeks after the Georges did business with him, which was convenient: they could now hire doctors on a commission basis, saving a lot more money.

Jeff and Chris talk freely with Foster in prison phone interviews, which sounds surprisingly dishonest. Chris refers to himself as a pioneer in his industry; Jeff brags about being creative, which makes Chris a mere worker. Foster finds many of them on camera, all talking much more happily than they seem. There’s a friend who was doing some complicated function in the waiting room and yelling at drug addicts that it’s best not to scream or shoot in the parking lot after filling out the prescription. (But man, did they do that?) The Kentucky drug dealer family is like casting denial. Justified (“Sorry ma’am, you don’t look small”), who were among the many people who drove ten hours to George’s clinics, collecting and going home to sell three. – Dollar pills at $20 each. Here’s the stripper’s wife, possibly a sad stepfather and retired DEA investigator Louis Fisher, who somehow convinced herself that working with these guys wasn’t a monumental crime.

Then there are the good guys: local news reporters, concerned neighbors and police officers who have very little American experience these days. They form a very compelling narrative about the rise and fall of Georges. They are allegedly responsible for the accusatory recordings we hear: phone calls in which the brothers and their owners dispel any suspicion that they understood how they used these drugs and didn’t care. When one of the patients’ cars left the clinic, climbed up and died trying to cross the tracks in front of the train, these men actually laughed that they would be such a fool. And they did it on the phone they heard, like idiots.

Foster’s research and narration are very satisfying, even if the results aren’t. Many of them ended up in jail, but of course it was too short, too delicate, and they didn’t serve in the same cells as the heads of the big pharmacy that made this horror story possible. Chris George is out now, welcoming his new girlfriend home with a smile as he talks about his new business ventures. He tells Foster he didn’t do anything wrong: Drug addicts were responsible for their own decisions, he says. Somewhere, a Republican strategist is wondering if he can vote for this guy in November. This is Florida, so the answer is probably yes.