Mad Machine Films today announced the North American release of the documentary feature film, CBD Nation, distributed by Gravitas Ventures and available to mass audiences on August 25, 2020 via Amazon, iTunes and video on demand channels.
Explains the film’s director and producer David Jakubovic, “Over the course of this project, I came to realize that cannabis is far from a gateway drug; for many, it’s actually an exit drug from Pharmaceuticals and Narcotics. And in the U.S. – which has 5% of the world’s population consuming 75% of the world’s pharmaceuticals – we can no longer afford to be in the dark about the facts. Facts can save lives.”
Featuring the world’s leading experts in cannabis science and medicine – including acclaimed Israeli scientist Raphael Mechoulam, Ph.D., the ‘father of cannabis research’ whose 1960s discovery of THC jump-started the medical and scientific revolution around cannabis – CBD Nation offers a compelling look at 60 years’ worth of published and ongoing research.
“We published our findings thirty-seven years ago: cannabidiol (CBD) blocks epileptic attacks in patients. What happened? Nothing for thirty years,” states Raphael Mechoulam, President of The Multidisciplinary Center for Cannabinoid Research at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. “Nothing happened until desperate parents like those in this film did their own research and found out that cannabidiol can help children with epilepsy. But epilepsy is just one of many conditions that we know cannabis medicine can treat. If the world chooses to not look at all of the science, it is not ignorance – it’s negligence.”
Adds longtime cannabis activist, entrepreneur, and restorative justice champion, Steve DeAngelo, who also appears in the film: “CBD Nation brings you the real science that decades of U.S. government sponsored misinformation have hidden from public view. Watch it, and learn why cannabis may just be the most valuable medicine ever discovered by human beings.”
Shot in 2018 over the course of six months in the United States, Canada, and Israel, CBD Nation marries a wealth of scientific breakthroughs with first-person narratives, following the emotional stories of patients for whom CBD is a lifesaving medicine.
- At age seven, Rylie Maedler was diagnosed with a rare degenerative bone disease called Aggressive Giant Cell Granuloma whereby tumors ate away at the bones of her face. Today, 14-year-old Rylie remains the only known person with this disease worldwide whose bones have regenerated.
- Military veteran Colin Wells served in the US Army Infantry from 2008-2012. He was deployed to Afghanistan in support of Operation Enduring Freedom from July 2009-July 2010 as well as Operation Moshtarak. Like many veterans, when Colin returned home he faced many physical and mental problems which led him to drug addiction and homelessness. CBD rich cannabis has helped his chronic pain and PTSD so much that he is a leader in the Veteran Cannabis Community and advocate for veterans’ rights to cannabis.
- Six-year-old Jayden David couldn’t walk, eat solid food, or even take a bath prior to being medicated with CBD. He has Dravet Syndrome, a rare and catastrophic form of childhood epilepsy. To combat his illness, Jayden became a patient of Harborside Health Center in Oakland, California, founded by brothers Steve DeAngelo and Andrew DeAngelo in 2006 and today the largest medical marijuana dispensary in the country with over 200,000 patients. Jayden had been prescribed 22 anti-seizure pills a day, which left him immobilized. The first day in Jayden’s life that he was seizure-free was the first day he took CBD.
“CBD Nation tells the authentic origin story of CBD… how it took sick kids like Jayden David, Rylie Maedler, and the late Charlotte Figi becoming messengers for this plant in order for mainstream society to acknowledge its potential as medicine,” shares Harborside co-founder, cannabis industry consultant and strategic advisor, Andrew DeAngelo. “It is a story about human biology, human rights, and the ultimate victory of truth and science, which could not be more relevant today.”
With interviews from more than 30 physicians, clinicians, researchers, and patients, CBD Nation is the first wide release film to dive deep into how the human body has evolved to work with cannabis, providing not only a second chance at life for patients but also a fighting chance for the world’s most politicized plant to be accepted for what it is: medicine.
“I hope that U.S. doctors, educators, and politicians see this film,” says Rylie Maedler, who worked closely with legislators in her home state of Delaware to pass Rylie’s Law, granting children with qualifying conditions access to medical cannabis. “Because I’m living proof of the fact that cannabis and CBD have a place in modern medicine.”
