THE CALLING: A MEDICAL SCHOOL JOURNEY, a new documentary directed by Asako Gladsjo, follows the intellectual and emotional journey of a group of students at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx. Captured through verité scenes and personal video diaries, the film offers a rare inside look at America’s health care system through the eyes of these aspiring practitioners as they learn what it takes to become a doctor in one of the country’s most underserved communities.
Asako Gladsjo is an award-winning documentary director, producer, and writer. Her recent credits include an upcoming reboot of the landmark civil rights series Eyes on the Prize for HBO; Rise and Rebuild: A Tale of Three Cities, a feature documentary co-directed with Sam Pollard; Why We Hate, a 6-hour Discovery series executive produced by Steven Spielberg and Alex Gibney; (Un)Well for Netflix; By Whatever Means Necessary, executive produced by Forest Whitaker and Nina Yang Bongiovi for Epix; the Emmy-nominated PBS special Black America since MLK: And Still I Rise; America by the Numbers for Maria Hinojosa and PBS; and Soundtracks: Songs that Made History for CNN; as well as multiple projects with Henry Louis Gates Jr. including the acclaimed six-hour PBS series The African Americans: Many Rivers to Cross, which won Emmy, DuPont, Peabody, and NAACP Image awards, as well as multiple seasons of the PBS Series Finding Your Roots and African American Lives. In addition to her work in the United States, Gladsjo has directed and written documentaries on society, culture, race, and immigration for international broadcasters including Arte (Une Enfance Gay, Prier dans la Cité des Anges), BBC (Pandemonium), France 2 and France 5 (Peuples d’Ici, Français d’Ailleurs), and others while based in Paris. She teaches directing in the School of Visual Art’s MFA Program in Social Documentary.
DC DOX Festival 2024; St Louis International Film Festival 2024; Orlando Film Festival 2024; Festival Internacional de cine documental Santiago Alvarez in Memoriam 2025 - Award Winner; Iris Global Health Film Festival - Award Winner
Executive Producer - Wilma Davis
Associate Producer - Koralie Barrau