SYNOPSIS
Jennifer, a Harvard PhD student, was signing a check at a restaurant when she found she could not write her own name. Months before her wedding, she became progressively more ill, losing the ability even to sit in a wheelchair. When doctors told her it was "all in her head," she turned her camera on herself and her community, a hidden world of millions confined to their homes bedrooms by ME, commonly called chronic fatigue syndrome.
Unrest is made by an award-winning team and is supported by the Sundance Institute, Chicken & Egg Pictures, the Harnisch Foundation, BRITDOC's Good Pitch, the Tribeca Film Institute, the Fledgling Fund, IFP, and over 2,593 Kickstarter backers.
It premiered in the documentary competition at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival, where it won a Special Jury Prize for editing. It has since screened at SxSW, CPH:DOX, HotDocs, River Run (Audience Award for Best Documentary Feature), and the Nashville Film Festival (Grand Jury Award for Best Documentary Feature), among other festivals. In the US, it will be broadcast on PBS's Independent Lens in early 2018.