Cannabis & Chronic Pain. Prevention. Addiction. ???

Okay. Just to sum up—over the last 10 months we’ve shot over 125 hours of footage for our feature film “RxCannabis”, about the struggle for medical marijuana. We’re now busy editing, making webisodes, and basically reaching out for feedback from you to help shape our direction from here.

The microcosm of our story is San Diego, where the forces, both pro and anti, are particularly strong for some reason. Since July, 2006, the Feds (with big guns) closed down ALL medical marijuana dispensaries in San Diego County, which means that over 3000 patients need to either get their cannabis “on the streets”, or make a 3 hour drive to a dispensary in LA County or beyond….

Craig, featured in the last posted clip (Webisode 1 – “Craig vs. Bill”) has become the protagonist of the whole story. He’s just a regular guy with a family to support. He’s in almost constant pain from his spine being crushed in an industrial accident. The San Diego County government wants to make it harder for Craig to get and use medical marijuana to treat his pain, but Craig has been fighting back.

My first meeting with Craig was in his shop – Old Toy Soldier Home - which is a whole amazing world – check out his site and buy some soldiers! You can see a lot of shots of his soldiers in Webisode 1.

Where are we headed next? The next tapes I’ll be editing will be about “the other side”, and about that slippery concept “addiction”. You’ll meet John, who ironically, works in a “prevention” organization about 10 minutes from Craig’s store!

My sympathies are obviously on Craig’s side, but as a documentary filmmaker, I need to at least TRY to “love all my characters” (otherwise it’ll just be all propaganda). I’m trying….help me – have you had experiences with cannabis addiction? Is it the drug or the person?? What do we do when one group swears by cannabis, and the other thinks it’s the devil incarnate???? Here’s an interesting site on cannabis pros and cons.

Till next time.