To the Extremes

Along with several courageous psychiatrists and their clients, the author sets out to film a documentary road movie that takes him to Switzerland, Europe, and the U.S. On their travels in mobile homes, they explore the depths of the human psyche in search of answers to the question: What is the human mind and how does it behave in psychotic extreme situations? By the time Edgar Hagen meets the Buddhist monk and trained psychiatrist Edward Podvoll in the U.S., Podvoll has only a few more months to live. His vision - that courage and friendship have the power to make recovery from mental illness possible - is an inspiring legacy. In a dialogue between Western psychology and Eastern spirituality, a message of hope emerges: It is always possible to regain mental clarity no matter how severely confused a mind may have become.