Victoria and Abdul
Hopefully, “Unrest” will be the first of many films Jennifer Brea will direct.
There are challenges, however, as she has severe myalgic encephalomyelitis, or chronic fatigue syndrome. Her movie, which opens Friday, Sept. 29, at the Vogue Theatre in San Francisco and Rialto Cinemas Elmwood in Berkeley, is an unflinching look at her battle with the disease and the millions of people around the world — about a million in the United States — who are afflicted, many of whom are essentially bedridden for the rest of their lives.
Brea was a doctoral candidate at Harvard and newly married when she suddenly developed a fever, her temperature as high as 114 degrees. When the fever subsided, she was severely hindered in her ability to move around. She was diagnosed with M.E. and told she would either conquer this in five years, or it would be a lifelong condition.
Brea is determined to film the next few years of her life — her husband, Omar, is often the cameraman — even the most excruciating, painful parts. Eventually, Brea is confined to bed. Her window on life is the Internet — and she soon meets up with dozens of fellow M.E. sufferers from around the world.
One young woman in England says she has grown 4 inches since being bedridden and has never stood at her full height. “I stay sane by going to many different places in my mind,” she says. “I love Australia.”
Another relates that a psychologist says her problem is mental and might have been caused “by a distant trauma, one I might not be able to remember.”
That’s a common problem with M.E. It was only recognized as a disease relatively recently. Even now, some doctors believe it is entirely psychological. In one poignant section of “Unrest,” a young woman from Denmark is forcibly taken from her parents and put under strict confinement by a psychologist — Denmark is one of the most backward countries in the Western world when it comes to treatment of chronic fatigue.
As for Brea, her condition continues to deteriorate. A well-traveled and accomplished career — she was a freelance journalist in China and Africa — has come to a screeching halt.
“There are some days I am really proud of myself for resisting the temptation to kill myself,” she confesses. “I don’t want to die, but at some point it’s hard to call this living.”
Home remedies to, if not cure it, at least make the condition more manageable are advanced by M.E. sufferers on the Internet. Brea tries just about every one, but not much helps.
One lead — that dry desert air helps — seems promising, and she and her husband move west.
Like many first-person medical documentaries — such as the recent “Gleason,” about a former football player with ALS — “Unrest” can be really hard to watch. But Brea’s film might be the beginning of hope for sufferers who see the film and could be a catalyst for conversations about the disease and additional funding into research. G. Allen Johnson is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: ajohnson@sfchronicle. com Twitter: @BRfilmsAllen