DO NOT RESUSCITATE: Documentary: Directed by Filmmaker, Davor Dirlic , Australia .



2 x 52 minute documentary series, on air SBS ‘Storyline Australia ’



Episode one 23 November 2006 at 8:30pm

Episode two 30 November 2006 at 8:30pm



Steve, Mary and Judy want the right to choose when and how to die.



Producer – Lizzette Atkins

Director – Davor Dirlic



A CIRCE FILMS PRODUCTION, Level 1, 21 William Street,Balaclava VIC 3183 Australia

Ph + 61 3 9525 8483 Fax + 61 3 9525 8936 Email latkins@netlink.com.au



© 2006 Film Finance Corporation Australia Limited and CIRCE Films Pty Ltd

Colour • Digital Betacam • 16:9 FHA • Stereo



Financed by FFC Australia: Produced in association with SBS Independent & Developed in Association with The Federal Australian Government together with the Australian Film Commission.

 

ONE PARAGRAPH SYNOPSIS



DO NOT RESUSCITATE is a film about three very different people, Steve, Mary and Judy, who want the right to choose how and when they die. We follow them over 18 months on their quest. In Australia assisting them to die is illegal and carries a 14 year jail sentence, despite the fact that 73% of Australians support euthanasia. But the prospect of dying a long and painful death drives them to go to extraordinary lengths to get access to the means to choose their own kind of death. This series is a profound exploration of how they and their loved ones deal with the stark reality of their impending death and the obstacles they face. As Steve, Mary, and Judy challenge the status quo, the laws governing euthanasia in Australia are put to the test.

 

ONE PAGE SYNOPSIS



DO NOT RESUSCITATE is a film about the truths people face when they have to deal with their own mortality.



We follow three very different people, Steve, Mary and Judy whose lives are driven by suffering over 18 months. They want the right to choose how and when they die. In Australia assisting them to die is illegal and carries a 14 year jail sentence, despite the fact that 73% of Australians support euthanasia. But the prospect of dying a long and painful death drives them to go to extraordinary lengths to get access to the means to choose their own kind of death.



The result is a profound exploration of how they and their loved ones deal with the stark reality of their impending death and the obstacles they face. As Steve, Mary and Judy challenge the status quo; the laws governing euthanasia in Australia are put to the test.



The series opens with an emotional plea on talkback radio from a dying man, STEVE GUEST (58) and the Australian public is confronted with the terrible reality of his suffering. Steve has cancer of the oesophagus and only has weeks to live. A former media advisor and press attaché, Steve is used to controversy.



His call strikes a chord with the Australian public and ignites a media debate about euthanasia. Over the next 2 weeks, Steve allows us to share, in intimate detail, his pain and existential suffering. We hear his thoughts and fears in the days leading up to his death. His appeal through the media for a ‘good death’ is answered and an anonymous supporter agrees – illegally – to provide the drug which gives Steve the means to kill himself. Following Steve’s death from an overdose of barbiturates, the coroner refers the case back to the police. The people who were close to him in his last days, including his brothers, become suspects in a homicide investigation.



MARY WALSH is an energetic 63-year-old wife, mother, grandmother and self-styled political activist. Five years ago, she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer with a ten percent chance of survival. She endured a gruelling regime of surgery and chemotherapy and is determined to commit suicide if her cancer returns. Desperate to be in control and despite her family’s concern, Mary

embarks on a trip to Mexico to buy the lethal drug Nembutal, which will become her means to this end. Obtaining the drug proves more difficult than she thought possible and Mary is totally unprepared for her foray into the Mexican underworld. Despite successfully obtaining the illegal drug, Mary is then confronted with the reality. In order to take the drug back to Australia

she will have to break the law and smuggle the drug back through customs.



JUDY BAYLISS (56) is in the grip of multiple sclerosis. A former schoolteacher, she was diagnosed in her mid twenties and has been living with this debilitating disease nearly all her life. She suffers intensely from her loss of independence as she depends more and more on the help of others for the simplest of tasks.



Fifteen years ago she tried to kill herself. She still wishes she had succeeded.



But Judy resists her decay with mixture of stubborn defiance and pure hope and she contemplates becoming a human guinea pig in the brave new world of stem cell transplants. She travels to China to visit neurosurgeon Dr Huang Hongyun, whose treatment is contentious because it involves the use of cells from aborted foetuses injected into the brain or spinal chord. When her trip to

China fails to deliver any real hope for stemming her disease, the choices available to Judy become increasingly unpalatable and she is forced to face the reality of her situation.



On this powerful and emotional journey, we intimately experience the lives of three people looking death in the face and the choices they make. Through the media, a dialogue surfaces between the Australian public, Dr Nicholas Tonti-Filippini, a Catholic bio-ethicist strongly opposed to euthanasia and Dr Rodney Syme, the president of Dying with Dignity Victoria and a staunch euthanasia campaigner. In conjunction with our three characters, Steve, Mary and Judy,

they discuss their deepest feelings around death and dying, their beliefs and fears.

 

DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT FROM DAVOR DIRLIC



Every human life is enigmatic and precious and our instinct is to hang on to fight for every breath of it. Yet for some, the suffering of life outweighs the instinctive fear of death. The two things we know about death: the absolute certainty that we will die and the uncertainty when or how we will die, don’t help us a great deal to accept it in a peaceful way. Voluntary euthanasia as a way of achieving dignified death is a hot topic that offers a particular angle on end-of-life issues. It also awakens our innermost fears and triggers an intense emotional response.



A film about people



Do Not Resuscitate (DNR) was always going to be a character driven documentary. From the very birth of the idea to make a film about the end-of life decisions I knew that the hardest thing was going to be to find subjects willing to participate. The topic has always been very contentious and wrapped with layers of ethical question not many people are keen to talk about. Particularly, not on camera.



I started the research by approaching the former Voluntary Euthanasia Society of Victoria , now Dying With Dignity Victoria . This is where I met a group of enthusiastic people who initially expressed their interest in taking part in filming only to turn down the offer even before the filming started. It was obvious that they feared of going public because of the possible criticism from

society and their families.



Three months into research I received a phone call from Mary Walsh. She introduced herself as a 62 year-old cancer survivor who was determined to commit euthanasia if the cancer came back. Frustrated with the Government status quo stance on euthanasia, she was equally frustrated with a lack of support from her family about her wish to die on her own terms if she came out of remission.



Both strident and enthusiastic, Mary appeared to be ready to make a big splash. She was everything but camera shy and more than willing to use the filming opportunity to share her uncompromising views. After our first few interviews she asked me to follow her to a tattoo shop where she put a DO NOT RESUSCITATE tattoo on her chest. With such a statement I knew I found my first character.



As the filming started, I was introduced to Judy Bayliss, a former teacher who had struggled with multiple sclerosis for most of her life. Impressively educated, at 57, Judy had been experiencing the gradual loss of her speech and her bodily functions. Constantly oscillating between hope and despair Judy tried to commit suicide 15 years ago. She wished she had succeeded and she still considered euthanasia a possibility. What struck me the most about Judy was that, in spite of her resolution to deal herself out when life became absolutely unbearable, she had never stopped clinging onto a hope for cure.



Her existence resembled a long-term war between life and death options. Her simple but sharp comments forced me to re-evaluate my concept of euthanasia, thus giving my cinematic journey a more balanced direction.



I met Steve Guest two weeks before he died. In the last stages of cancer of the oesophagus at the age of 58, the former journalist and media campaigner went on ABC morning radio pleading for his right to die in a peaceful and dignified way. My producer Lizzette Atkins got in touch with him within minutes after the radio program finished. The next thing I knew I was driving to Point

Lonsdale, to interview the man, who did not want to live more than he had planned. Steve absolutely charmed me with his sincerity and willingness to talk openly about his approaching death. Being a former journalist Steve understood my job very well and allowed me to come exceptionally close when circling with my camera around his dying body and asking questions. He was a rarely brave and articulate man who decided to use his grave situation to raise the

awareness of a lack of political and legal will to tackle the issue of medically assisted dying.



Our life experience makes us what we are



What made the filming of Steve, Judy and Mary compelling was the realisation that behind their cry to achieve control over their deaths dwelt an amazing density of 3 very unique personalities and life circumstances. The more I filmed them and the more I became a regular presence in their lives the more I became aware of how every single stance, every thought, every belief had a deep seeded history behind it. As much as the issue of euthanasia was a moral complexity hard to resolve, these people’s life stories were equally complex, if not more. I found myself dealing with real people whose rich life experience made them who they were. In that sense they proved to be as right or wrong and as perfect or imperfect as any of us could be. Their life accounts were taking me right inside their complex worlds where a personal story told in an intimate way, had a powerful, universal resonance.



A collation of observational, intimate and poetic images.



For me this two year cinematic journey continually had a sense of heading into the new, the unknown. A sense of deep exploration into things. Camera was set to find its way to reveal and un-veil. To explore. To come a step closer. How close an eye or a hand could be filmed?



The 3 stories unfold following the emotional logic. We are here on a poignant ride with our characters. We listen. We want to know more. After the face is looked at, camera moves on. To explore the wall behind it. Someone’s house, bedroom, window…there is a cloud out there.



From time to time images dissolve. A note on piano is played. There is a silhouette backed up by the sound of cello. A character’s shadow caught in a moment. Feeling of a gentle wind that incites an evocative flow of rough, touching and curious passages. Things could look funny for a moment. This is an intimate journey. It is confessional. Personal enough to remind us that we

all are made of the same human material.

 

A B O U T :

Director – Davor Dirlic



Davor Dirlic grew up in Croatia where he graduated from the Zagreb school for Film and TV. He began making low budget films in the eighties. ‘Canal’ is a 17min. documentary that won the Best Script & Direction Award at the Yugoslav Television Festival in 1988. Ironically, given what happened in the region later, the film tells a story of two Albanian workmen who save a four-year-old Serbian boy from a 10-meter deep canal. In 1989, two years before the war started, Davor left the country and moved to Melbourne . His Australian made short film ‘One Such Night’ won the Best Independent Film at the Festival of Fantastic Films in Manchester UK in 1996. Davor's last film ‘Passport To Parenthood’, reviewed as the pick of the week, screened on SBS in 2004.

Addendum to Documentary Profile

(Copy from: Mary Walsh's Diary Entry on www.yourchoiceindying.com)

Thursday October 26, 2006: 5.30 am

In addition to this website I had arranged with Everlasting Magic Design, my web builder to organise another site directly related to the impending documentary http://www.donotresuscitatedocumentary.com which is dedicated to the filmmaker's portrayal of significant aspects of both his subjects and his own thoughts. I mailed out 100 printed copies mainly to people who do not have a computer but may have a television, and then I emailed the link to a number of people including the filmmaker Davor Dirlic as a matter of courtesy.

I believe his generous response fails to understand the message I wanted to convey in separating the individual sites. The reason is simple, - to highlight the importance of a person of his resources to address such a contentious subject. The matter of dying and the individual's ability to address its methods, by direct action, by legal medical assistance, or surviving with intolerable pain.

The man with the camera, the picture that tells a thousand words.

I never saw myself as "brave", and I can't speak for Steve or Judy. (Surviving a catholic childhood was bravery, cancer was not optional).

Bravery requires choice - and we individual characters did not have that option. We had to endure regardless, our individual dramas - The filmmaker had choice!. He chose us!

I wanted the filmmaker's role and observations to be separated from this site which is generated by an emotional, passionate believer in Pro Choice for the individual. The filmmaker without necessarily sharing my views allowed me to express myself. Until yesterday it had not occurred to me to "investigate" the credentials of this particular film maker for myself. I met him personally and relied only on my gut instinct that he would treat my story with respect.

I have not seen the documentary but I feel comfortable with whatever is revealed.

Now I have discovered, Mr Davor Dirlic has some 130 entries on the internet and I am amazed that it never occurred to me to look past the man standing in front of me and the Passport to Parenthood screened in 2004. I felt a little foolish in assuming that somehow, I'd felt he was there, just for Do Not Resuscitate. He had the capacity to make one feel unique. I felt a sense of ownership about him, which in hindsight was so stupid of me. He never spoke of his own achievements. The professional filmmaker made me feel totally natural and as I was moved to say to him a couple of times, "I am no actress - what you see is what you're getting". I am no good at pretending what I don't feel. My family felt sorry for him coping with my directness.

I have little talent for anything but expressing opinions and yes I am very committed to Pro Choice so follow through my very strong opinions with decisive action. I expect that of myself!....If in talking about me, they also remember my ambitious activism in promoting legislative change for the Medical Treatment Act 1988 then the message not the individual will have triumphed. It is always about the message being heard across as many mediums as possible. I could never have envisage myself in front of a television screen but the skill of the craftsman in the filmmaker just made it so natural for me to continue being me, blunt and forthright and yes, strident!

Suffice to say that ultimately the purpose of the link was to put a frame around the importance of the person who comes up with the concept, goes looking for avenues of information, respects differing points of views, remains patient in the face of stupidity, ignorance or just plain inability to understand the concept. Travels long distances, works long hours, spends times reassuring others that he means no harm to his subjects. Faces opposition from both his subjects and their families yet manages to hold it all together with patience and tact and an intelligence that eventually achieves what he wants of them. He doesn't even have to like us as individuals but we won't know because he is so professional in his attitudes that personal views do not necessarily surface.

I am very grateful that a man who loves music, art, cats, Japanese food, filmmaking, directing and writing, in no particular order, chose to make a documentary with the assistance of SBS and others, which will enable further discussion and debate about the virtues of Pro Choice. I am not paying Mr Dirlic compliments to flatter him - I don't need to - the documentary is already achieved but I am acknowledging my debt of gratitude with a public acknowledgement of the service he rendered on behalf of the vulnerable.

Thank you, Davor Dirlic, for the opportunities you provided that allowed the voices of Steve, Mary and Judy to be heard.

Recently I was commiserating with a female who could not convince her friend to visit a doctor, middle aged and spotting blood. She'd talked and argued for months but at my suggestion sent her the photo of my abdomen after surgery. Within 24 hours the woman had made an appointment with a specialist. Six months of talk, but only one picture. The one I displayed on the steps of Parliament House and Flinders Street Station - ugly, yes very!, but effective to convey a message that explains much just by its impact.

Imagine the honour of having such a filmmaker as Davor Dirlic convey a whole story about three people's "pictures"!