Hot Docs 2022: Make People Better

It’s common for the subject matter of a documentary to be more interesting than the documentary itself. So Make People Better is not an outlier in having a fascinating subject and middling cinematic execution. The film traces recent events in the world of human genetic engineering and seeks to expose the truth behind the scandal of Dr. He Jiankui, who in 2018 became the first doctor to produce genetically-engineered humans, only to be arrested in the fallout of the scandal. Pitched more as a docu-thriller than an overview documentary, Make People Better strains under the weight of its salacious approach to the material, clichéd music, and flashy use of graphics and archival clips. But it also reveals some profoundly disturbing truths about modern science and where our world is headed. Like so many documentaries before it, it’s saved by the strength of its subject matter.

Cody Sheehy’s film follows the advent of so-called “designer babies” and particularly the case of Dr. He Jiankui, who in 2018 revealed that he had produced the world’s first genetically-engineered human beings. Shortly after Dr. He’s announcement to the world, he was detained by the Communist Party of China and eventually sentenced to three years in prison. The medical world and the CCP painted him as a rogue actor, but Make People Better makes clear through interviews and investigative research that Dr. He was hardly acting alone. He simply was acting first and the public did not react to his actions the way he anticipated, igniting a firestorm of public scrutiny that the CCP handled by arresting and imprisoning him.

Make People Better does not offer an overview of genetic engineering or Crispr Cas9; it is explicitly not meant as an educational documentary about this field. Rather, it veers more towards true crime in its focus on Dr. He. The film contains interviews with scientific historians, journalists, and figures connected to Dr. He (often called “JK” in the film), including his PR manager, who is interviewed with a fake name and makeup and a beard distorting his identity. 

Through these interviews and an assortment of archival footage, we come to understand that Dr. He is something of a scapegoat for the wider world of scientific research. Behind closed doors, none of his colleagues, fellow scientists, or CCP handlers had issues with his unethical approach nor his willingness to experiment with human engineering despite a lack of “medical necessity.” In a phone call, Dr. He claims that James Watson, one of the discoverers of the double-helix structure of human DNA along with Francis Crick, told him at a conference that the only thing he should be concerned with was to “make people better.” The film’s title is an acknowledgement of this clandestine encouragement of Dr. He and his unethical approach.

However, when He’s announcement of his scientific breakthroughs was met with horror by the wider public, fellow scientists abandoned him and the CPP quietly revoked any endorsements of his work. In the most chilling moments in the film, Sheehy captures admissions that the wider scientific community will build off of Dr. He’s work and continue to work behind closed doors until the wider world is supposedly ready for human engineering. There are too many commercial and geopolitical interests at stake in the research to allow progress to stall. So they never indicate that they will stop research into human engineering, but simply to do it the “right way.” 

For instance, an interview with acclaimed geneticist George Church has Church admitting that while it’s unfortunate how Dr. He went about things, he thinks there’s no reason why the wider community cannot learn from and expand upon his work. In such comments, I’m reminded of echoes of how many Western scientists reacted to experiments by the Nazis in the mid-20th century—“Yes, the experiments were awful, but why let the work go to waste?” 

Similarly, in footage of the 2018 conference in Hong Kong where Dr. He faced scrutiny for his work and then was detained by the CCP, the board members wait a mere five minutes after Dr. He is taken into custody before saying that it’s unfortunate that the first step was a misstep, and now they must be careful that the next step is the right step. What is never contemplated is whether a next step should be made at all—Jeff Goldblum’s Ian Malcolm puts it best in Jurassic Park: “Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn't stop to think if they should.” Therein lies the film’s chilling revelations about the state of science in our modern era.

The film never fully capitalizes on these many avenues of investigation. For instance, it could have easily linked the attitudes of modern scientists about genetic engineering to that of scientists in the mid-20th century during the developments of nuclear weapons, showing how history demonstrates that scientists have too often not been beholden to ethics in research. Obvious parallels to the handling of the COVID-19 pandemic are also left unexplored. So while Make People Better gestures at the broader implications of its most interesting thematic threads, it never follows those threads to grander, more investigative, and possibly more damning commentary about the state of science in 2022.

And yet, the film still offers a worthy, fascinating revelation about the world of modern science at its core. The presentation as an investigative thriller, with its repeated use of archival clips, recreations, and audio of Dr. He, limits the film’s effect. The presentation makes the central issue seem to be more about a person than a system, more a record of individual crimes or missteps than a portrait of systematic dysfunctions. 

But Make People Better does ultimately succeed in showing that Dr. He was not a rogue actor, but rather the first scientist to open the pandora’s box of human genetic engineering. The film makes clear that ethics is too often not a consideration in the modern world of scientific research and that even if broad agreements were made on ethical approach, there’s no way to enforce that approach in a world dominated by differing nations and insatiable commercial interests. So long as scientists can claim that they are “making people better,” there’s no stopping unethical actions made in the name of progress.

6 out of 10

Make People Better (2022, USA)

Directed by Cody Sheehy.

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