April 23, 2025

Alcohol: Adrian Chiles – Drinkers Like Me

In this revealingly intimate documentary for BBC2, Adrian Chiles takes a long, hard look at his own love of boozing. He wants to find out why he and many others don’t think they are addicted to alcohol despite finding it almost impossible to enjoy life without it. Adrian, who drinks almost every day, decides to start a drinking diary and soon finds out his intake is way over the recommended limit. He decides to visit his parents to find out what it was that motivated him to start drinking as a teenager and reveals that sneaking into pubs underage was all about friendship and being part of something, and that the allure of the social side of drinking has never really left him since his teens.
April 23, 2025

Alcohol & The Brits – Drinking for England

This BBC2 documentary depicts the drinking culture in Britain in the 90s and the bond that Brits have with booze. It follows people who drink heavily and use poetry and song to describe their tragic, yet sometimes amusing, relationship with alcohol. They include a man who drinks a minimum of ten pints of beer a night, a fashion model who drinks until she collapses, and a woman receiving detoxification treatment in a private hospital.
April 23, 2025

Alcohol at Home – Britain’s Secret Drinkers

It is commonly believed that binge drinking culture in Britain is their most serious drinking problem. However, experts in this short video, featured on the BBC programme ‘Tonight’, discuss a different concern – at home drinkers. According to a study discussed in the video, more and more people are regularly drinking alcohol at home, sometimes every night of the week. For some, it’s seen as a reward after a long day at work, and for others, it’s a way of relaxing. Unfortunately, many people appear unaware of the consequences of such behaviour.
April 23, 2025

Beating Alcohol Addiction Through Evidence-Based Treatment

This documentary follows Mike Pond, a therapist managing his alcohol addiction. He was only ever offered one treatment after losing his practice, his house, his family, and becoming homeless: Alcoholics Anonymous. This abstinence-based treatment approach did not work for him, so he started looking for other ways to heal himself and others. Mike is an advocate for “compassionate, evidence-based treatments” and feels that “harm reduction, or any positive change, offers clients the best chance of beating addictions.”
April 23, 2025

UK Drinking Culture: A Royal Hangover

This documentary provides insight into the United Kingdom’s reliance on alcohol and the history of their binge drinking culture. In comparison to other countries, binge drinking is more socially acceptable in the UK. Unfortunately, they spend about 21 billion pounds every year because of this problem, with about 1.6 million people being dependent on alcohol. Russell Brand used to be one of them and you’ll hear his speech on this topic, including his own experiences with substance abuse.
April 20, 2025

New Zealand Drinking Culture – PROOF with Guyon Epsiner

Follow Guyon Epsiner, an award-winning journalist living in New Zealand, as he talks with several individuals who provide insight into the effects of alcohol and drinking culture, specifically the associated harms felt by community members. He even speaks to someone from the alcohol industry who tries to argue for the potential benefits of alcohol. This documentary, however, can see through this and dives into the predatory nature of these companies, such as how poorer communities are riddled with liquor stores, and how the harms that communities endure are ignored.
April 20, 2025

The Lois Wilson Story: When Love Is Not Enough

This movie features Barry Pepper as Bill Wilson, the founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, and Winona Ryder as Lois Wilson, who subsequently created Al-Anon. It was written by William G. Borchett who was close friends with Lois. The novel and film “describe in compelling detail Lois’s comfortable beginnings, her attraction to a clever and persistent young man, her years of despair as drinking claimed an ever-increasing part of Bill, her joy when he sobered up, and her frustration as AA came to dominate Bill’s life”
April 20, 2025

Britain’s Drink Problem (UK Drinking Culture)

Adrian Chiles wants to “know why this multi-billion pound industry [Britain’s alcohol producers] is allowed to regulate itself – make up its own rules.” He discusses with others, both professionals and average people, the profound impact that alcohol is having on the country. This includes the rising number of alcoholics needing a liver transplant, the community’s confusion around ‘a standard drink’, and the hard-to-read designs that the alcohol industry uses for their warning labels.
April 20, 2025

Uganda’s Waragi (Moonshine) Epidemic

The VICE crew hang out with the locals where they make and drink alcohol with them. “Uganda is the alcoholism capital of Africa. One favourite type of booze the locals make is called Waragi.” They discovered that people were going blind and dying from drinking a dangerous version of it that is cut with industrial chemicals.