Jerome Lejeune - To the Least of My Brothers and Sisters (2015) [N/A]
Featuring:
Pierre Bellemare, Marthe Gautier, Keenan Kampa
Directed by:
Francois Lespes
Release Date:
April 2, 2015
Original Title:
Aux plus petits d’entre les miens
Alternate Titles:
To the least of these my brothers & sisters
Genres:
Documentary
Production Companies:
Aloest Productions
Ratings / Certifications:
FR: U
To the Least of My Brothers and Sisters is a new documentary on the life of Jerome Lejeune, the Father of Modern Genetics that was made to celebrate the 20th anniversary of his death. Filmed on two continents, it contains numerous interviews with former colleagues, families, current medical researchers, and others, all who express the importance of Jerome Lejeune in both the history of medicine and the defense of the dignity of human life.
Physician and genetics researcher, Jérôme Lejeune acquired an international reputation in 1958 when he discovered the Trisomy 21, cause of Down Syndrome. He hoped his discovery would change the way people looked at children with Down Syndrome, who came by hundreds to his medical consultations. He had only one obsession : to find someday a cure. The meteoric rise of this young French scientist will be be stopped in a flash in 1969. While receiving the William Allen Award in San Francisco, the highest award in genetics, he delivered a speech defending the human dignity of the embryo, causing an earthquake in the scientific sphere. A few months before, he realized that his discovery would be used against his convictions, by opening the door to abortion of embryos with genetic abnormalities. Who was Jérôme Lejeune? A great scientist or a man of faith ? Nowadays what is the state of research on Trisomy 21, in which he had placed so much hope? 20 years after his death, the director François Lespes wondered about this man's complex personality, who had such an extraordinary fate. « Jerome Lejeune - To the least of these my brothers & sisters » is investigating on the man of science and beliefs, from Paris to Indianapolis, from friends to confrères, from supporters to detractors.
