Nise: The Heart of Madness is a Brazilian film based on the true life story of psychiatrist, Nise Da Silveira, who refused to treat schizophrenia patients with electroshock therapy and instead used art and painting.  The film directed by Roberto Berliner won the Best Film-Audience Award at the Rio de Janeiro International Film Festival, and the Grand Prix along with the Best Actress Award at the Tokyo International Film Festival.

Nise: The Heart of Madness will open theatrically on Friday, April 28, 2017 in New York (Village East) and Chicago (Gene Siskel Film Center) with a wider national release to follow.

1940’s, Brazil- Dr. Nise da Silveira (played by award-winning actress Gloria Pires) is at work in a psychiatric hospital on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro and refuses to employ the new and violent electroshock for the treatment of schizophrenics. Ridiculed by doctors, she is forced to take the abandoned Sector for Occupational Therapy, where she starts a revolution through paints, dogs and love.

Through her efforts, renowned modern art museums opened their doors to artists nobody ever heard of. Many critics pointed out that these exhibitions revealed painters that went on to be ranked amongst the best Brazillian artists of the century. Behind this miracle there was no art academy, patron or dealer. The artists were schizophrenic, poor, hospitalized for several decades, abandoned by their families and hopeless to all but da Silveira. NISE:THE HEART OF MADNESS tells the real life story of this “miracle” and the life of this rebellious, frail and engaging psychiatrist.