"Meth Storm" focuses on the meth epidemic in the rural United States. Basically, these people have no prospects: there are no jobs, and so they'll continue to live in absolute squalor and do meth.

Notice how, when the crack epidemic affected African-Americans, they got called addicts, but now that the opioid epidemic has hit white people, it gets treated as an epidemic?

As a former paramedic, unfortunately this is exactly how meth affects not just the user, but their families and the community,

"I'm not trying to be rude, nanny, but tell Dad he needs to make better choices"

"Meth Storm" is a disarmingly sweet documentary about a meth using family in Arkansas. You wouldn't think a documentary of this topic could be sweet, but it is. The family this documentary centers around is a mother, a step father and her three sons (?) and two daughters. The mother and her son's are meth addicts who have each served repeated times in jail. Most are without jobs, but somehow still find drugs and love to share with each other. Drugs and love is what passes between these family members, and it is both heartbreaking and redeeming to see. Heartbreaking to see the mother seem to teach addiction, but also redeeming for her to try to maintain a support system when that return to jail takes place. Her family is both of the more dysfunctional and compassionate one could hope to find. It's easy to judge her incapabilities but the documentary teaches you to try to be more respectful.

The people busting these families are also surprisingly respectful which seems rare to see. One phrase I remember is a police man (and mayor of a small town) hoping to be there "to help, not to hurt." I liked what he had to say to the people he busted.

"Meth Storm" is not exploitive of this meth addicted family, although it does show many kinds of nitty gritty which speaks of a rare kind of trust between filmmaker and subject more than anything. For this quality I commend this documentary, although for most people it will be entirely not what they expect. If you want to spend an hour of your life judging some meth addicted "white trash" people, unfortunately "Meth Storm" is not for you. It's not until the end of the film that the mother's rape becomes even hinted at. There's no glorification of the unfortunate here. This is a wise and hopeful documentary with a lot of humanity.

Criticisms because the title doesn't necessarily reflect what the documentary is really about. This is more of a portrait of a family and one police officer rather than a documentary about meth on any kind of grand scale. There is not really any violence either as might be expected from the nature of the word "storm." "Meth Storm" is decidedly mellow, and I liked the change of pace.