Going The Distance - A Honeymoon Adventure. Full Length Feature Documentary.
What makes one couple stay together for a lifetime while others divorce after 6 months? How does a newly married couple know if they’ve got what it takes to stay together? We hear endlessly of celebrity divorce and acrimonious separation. Hollywood films only ever take us to the altar – so why would anyone think they could share an entire life together?
British newly-weds Alanna and Mike Clear put their own love to the test, in the lab and on the road, while finding out from other couples the secret of “Going the Distance”.
This is a celebration of the stories and lessons from real people making love last in their own individual and fascinating way.
The couple use their own love to test the science of relationships:
1. Dr Helen Fisher. Rutgers University, New York: the brain.
a. Biological anthropologist Helen Fisher conducted 2 experiments on the couple at NYU:
i. A Functional MRI Scan of their brains. Mike and Alanna went into an MRI scan and had their brains analysed as they were shown various photos of the other one. Dr Fisher and neurologist Lucy Brown will be able to analyse the neurophysiological responses and see if they are “in love”
ii. A personality compatibility study – to see if they are suited to spend the rest of their lives with each other.
2. Dr John Gottman. The Gottman Institute, Seattle: the body language.
a. The Godfather of Marital prediction studies is famed for using a 5 minute clip of a couple arguing to predict, with 90% accuracy, whether the couple will stay together for life or not. Mike and Alanna were analysed by a Gottman trained therapist who judged their compatibility, they then attended a Couples Therapy Weekend with the Gottmans themselves.
3. Eric Holzle. Founder of Scientificmatch.com: the DNA.
a. Engineer turned founder of the only dating website to use DNA to match potential couples. Based on the scientific theory that couples are attracted to members of the opposite sex with the most different immune responses to their own, the site tests for 3 alleles. Mike and Alanna had their cheeks swabbed and the results are being analysed.
All 3 scientists put their predictions in an envelope, which the couple take with them.
The couple collected a Ural Tourist T motorbike and sidecar from Classic Motorcycles and Urals of Alaska, and then set off on one of the toughest overland adventures on the planet – from top to bottom of the 20,000 mile Pan-American Highway, the longest road in the world (not unlike marriage itself!) They found couples from different cultures, beliefs and locations – mad stories of Mormons, traditions of First Nations, Hollywood divorces, hippy rituals, and shot-gun weddings in Vegas. The cast is both extensive and diverse, ranging from the normal to the outrageous. Each of whom gave great advice for the couple on the secrets of their lasting love.
At the end of the road in Argentina, the couple opened the envelope, to see if the scientists thought they would Go The Distance...
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The Adventure Travel Film Festival writes:
"The resulting film is one of the most original and remarkable films of the last decade. An odyssey in the truest sense but more than that, a film that has absolutely no competition. A stand-alone masterpiece."