A Walk to Beautiful

Last updated
A Walk to Beautiful
A walk to beautiful poster.jpg
Directed byMary Olive Smith
Produced bySteven M. Engel
Mary Olive Smith
Edited byAndrew Ford
Music byDavid Schommer
Distributed byEngel Entertainment
Release dates
  • May 5, 2007 (2007-05-05)(San Francisco Film Festival)
  • February 8, 2008 (2008-02-08)(United States)
Running time
85 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

A Walk to Beautiful is a 2007 American documentary film, executive produced by Steven M. Engel and Helen Diana ("Heidi") Reavis, produced and distributed by Engel Entertainment, about women who suffer from childbirth injuries in Ethiopia. In 2007, it premiered in film festivals and was chosen for the International Documentary Association Best Feature Documentary Film of the Year award. The following year, the film opened in theaters in the United States in New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. A 52-minute version of A Walk to Beautiful that premiered on NOVA on PBS on May 13, 2008, won the 2009 Emmy Award in the Outstanding Informational Programming (Long Form) category on September 21, 2009, at the News and Documentary Emmy Awards ceremony on September 21, 2009, at Rose Hall, Lincoln Center in New York City.

Contents

Production and release

The film was funded by Engel Entertainment and also received grants from NOVA , Fistula Foundation, the Marianthi Foundation, UNFPA, the Fledgling Film Fund, and private donors.

A Walk to Beautiful premiered in 2007 and was theatrically released by its production company, Engel Entertainment, in the United States on February 8, 2008 in New York and on February 29, 2008, in Los Angeles. [1] [2] This same year, it airs on Public Broadcasting Service's Nova series, starting from May 13, 2008. [3]

Synopsis

A Walk to Beautiful tells the stories of five women in Ethiopia who are ostracized by their family and villages due to their suffering from obstetric fistula, a serious medical condition caused by failed childbirth under conditions of insurmountable poverty and inadequate health care. These women live in isolation with a sense of loneliness and shame due to rejection by their own. Each of these five women chose to reclaim her life by taking the long and exhausting journey to the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital, so she could receive the medical treatment available only there. Upon arriving at the hospital, the women are treated free of charge, resulting in new beginnings. Not every patient can be cured, but each woman takes her own journey toward becoming an independent and productive member of her community once again.

Reception

Critical reaction

The documentary was given positive reviews by critics. Metacritic reported the film had an average score of 82 out of 100, based on six reviews, classifying A Walk to Beautiful as a universal acclaim. [4] It was regarded as "competently made, precisely shot, and buoyantly humanistic" by Variety , [5] and Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times commented that "A Walk to Beautiful will leave you speechless two times over first with despair, then with joy. Neither unmentionable subject matter nor nonexistent commercial prospects can keep this documentary from having a power over your heart that is unparalleled." [6] According to The New York Times , A Walk to Beautiful quietly criticises a chauvinist society in some countries where women are considered "lovers, mothers, and servants", and anyone who cannot fulfill these roles is disregarded by her community. [7]

Box office

As of February 2008, the film had grossed $7,718 dollars in the United States. [8]

Nominations and awards

A Walk to Beautiful was awarded the Emmy in the Informational Programming (Long Form) category on September 21, 2009, by the NATAS. It was named by the International Documentary Association as the Best Feature documentary film of the year. [9] [10] It received the Golden Gate Award at the San Francisco International Film Festival and the Audience Choice Award and Interfaith Award for Best Documentary at the 16th Annual AT&T St. Louis International Film Festival. [11] [12]

At the international Denver Film Festival, it was given People’s Choice Award for best documentary. [13]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tina Fey</span> American actress, comedian, writer, producer, and playwright (born 1970)

Elizabeth Stamatina "Tina" Fey is an American actress, comedian, writer, producer, and playwright. Fey was a cast member and head writer for the NBC sketch comedy series Saturday Night Live from 1997 to 2006. After her departure from SNL, she created the NBC sitcom 30 Rock and the Netflix sitcom Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt (2015–2020), the former of which she also starred in. Fey is also known for her work in film, including Mean Girls (2004), Baby Mama (2008), Date Night (2010), Megamind (2010), Muppets Most Wanted (2014), Sisters (2015), Whiskey Tango Foxtrot (2016), Wine Country (2019), and Soul (2020).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jessica Biel</span> American actress (born 1982)

Jessica Claire Timberlake is an American actress. She has received various accolades, including a Young Artist Award, and nominations for a Primetime Emmy Award and two Golden Globe Awards.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Judd Apatow</span> American comedian and filmmaker (born 1967)

Judd Apatow is an American filmmaker, comedian, and actor best known for his work in comedy and drama films. He is the founder of Apatow Productions, through which he produced and directed the films The 40-Year-Old Virgin (2005), Knocked Up (2007), Funny People (2009), This Is 40 (2012), Trainwreck (2015), The King of Staten Island (2020), and The Bubble (2022).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kirby Dick</span> American film director, producer, and screenwriter

Kirby Bryan Dick is an American film director, producer, screenwriter, and editor best known for directing documentary films. He received Academy Award nominations for Best Documentary Feature for directing Twist of Faith (2005) and The Invisible War (2012). He has also received numerous awards from film festivals, including the Sundance Film Festival and Los Angeles Film Festival.

Sharron Miller is an American television and film director, producer, and screenwriter. She is one of the pioneering women directors who worked regularly in mainstream Hollywood in the 1970s and 1980s. In 1984 she was the first woman ever to win the coveted Directors Guild of America Award for directing a narrative (non-documentary) work.

<i>Autism: The Musical</i> 2007 film

Autism: The Musical is an independent documentary film directed by Tricia Regan. In April 2007, the film premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York City. The film recounts six months of the lives of five children who are on the autism spectrum in Los Angeles, California as they write and rehearse for an original stage production.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jeffrey Schwarz</span> American filmmaker

Jeffrey Schwarz is an American Emmy Award-winning film producer, director, and editor. He is known for an extensive body of documentary work including Boulevard! A Hollywood Story, The Fabulous Allan Carr, Tab Hunter Confidential, I Am Divine, Vito, Wrangler: Anatomy of an Icon and Spine Tingler! The William Castle Story.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fistula Foundation</span> American maternal health organization

Fistula Foundation is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization focused on treatment of obstetric fistula, funding more repair surgeries than any other organization, public or private. As of September 2022, they support hospitals and doctors in over 20 countries across Africa and Asia. The foundation is dedicated to treating obstetric fistula by covering the full cost of fistula repair surgery for poor women who would otherwise not be able to access treatment. They also provide fistula surgeon training, equipment and facility upgrades that make fistula treatment as safe as possible, post-surgery counseling and support for healed patients. The foundation has been recognized by several organizations for its transparency, effectiveness and efficiency, earning a top "A" rating from Charity Watch and a four star rating from Charity Navigator for 16 years in a row, placing it in the top 1% of charities reviewed on the site. The foundation has also been selected as one of 22 charities recommended by Princeton Professor Peter Singer's organization, The Life You Can Save. The organization's cost-effectiveness was also noted by GiveWell in 2019.

<i>War/Dance</i> 2007 film by Sean Fine

War/Dance is a 2007 American documentary film written and directed by Sean Fine and Andrea Nix Fine and produced by Shine Global's Susan MacLaury, a professor at Kean University, and Albie Hecht. It was nominated for the 2008 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature and received the Emmy Awards for Best Documentary and Best Cinematography in 2010.

<i>Man on Wire</i> 2008 documentary film directed by James Marsh

Man on Wire is a 2008 documentary film directed by James Marsh. The film chronicles Philippe Petit's 1974 high-wire walk between the Twin Towers of New York's World Trade Center. It is based on Petit's 2002 book, To Reach the Clouds, released in paperback with the title Man on Wire. The title of the film is taken from the police report that led to the arrest of Petit, whose performance lasted for almost an hour. The film is crafted like a heist film, presenting rare footage of the preparations for the event and still photographs of the walk, alongside re-enactments and present-day interviews with the participants, including Barry Greenhouse, an insurance executive who served as the inside man.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bill Guttentag</span> American film director

Bill Guttentag is an American dramatic and documentary film writer-producer-director. His films have premiered at the Sundance, Cannes, Telluride and Tribeca film festivals, and he has won two Academy Awards.

A River Changes Course is a 2013 documentary by Kalyanee Mam. The film explores the damage rapid development has wrought in her native Cambodia on both a human and environmental level. The film premiered at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival on January 21, 2013 and won the Grand Jury Prize for World Documentary. The film also received the Golden Gate Award for Best Documentary Feature at the 2013 San Francisco International Film Festival.

Marion "Muffie" Meyer is an American director, whose productions include documentaries, theatrical features, television series and children’s films. Films that she directed are the recipients of two Emmy Awards, CINE Golden Eagles, the Japan Prize, Christopher Awards, the Freddie Award, the Columbia-DuPont, and the Peabody Awards. Her work has been selected for festivals in Japan, Greece, London, Edinburgh, Cannes, Toronto, Chicago and New York, and she has been twice nominated by the Directors Guild of America.

Nina Rosenblum is an American documentary film and television producer and director and member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the Directors Guild of America. Italian Fotoleggendo magazine said Rosenblum “is known in the United States as one of the most important directors of the investigative documentary”.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tom Donahue (filmmaker)</span> American film director and producer

Tom Donahue is an American film director and producer. His latest documentaries include This Changes Everything, which he directed and produced, about systemic gender bias and discrimination against women in Hollywood and entertainment, and HBO's Bleed Out, which he produced with Ilan Arboleda under the banner of their independent production studio, CreativeChaos vmg. The Los Angeles Press Club awarded Bleed Out with the film Best Documentary and runner-up for Best Medical/Health Reporting at its annual National Arts and Entertainment Journalism Awards and SoCal Journalism Awards in July 2019. Both films premiered in the fall of 2018. Donahue has also received much critical acclaim for directing HBO's Casting By, which was nominated for an Emmy, and Thank You for Your Service, which was released theatrically by Gathr Films in 2016. In 2010, Donahue founded the production company CreativeChaos vmg with Ilan Arboleda and Steve Edwards.

<i>When I Walk</i> 2013 film

When I Walk is a 2013 autobiographical documentary film directed by Jason DaSilva. The film follows DaSilva during the seven years following his diagnosis of primary progressive multiple sclerosis. When I Walk premiered at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival, won Best Canadian Feature Documentary at the 2013 HotDocs Film Festival, and won an Emmy for the News & Documentary Emmy Award.

<i>Shout Gladi Gladi</i> 2015 film

Shout Gladi Gladi is a 2015 American-British documentary film about the obstetric fistula problem in Africa, co-directed by Adam Friedman and Iain Kennedy, narrated by Meryl Streep, and named for the celebration held after women completed treatment.

Marina Zenovich is an American filmmaker known for her biographical documentaries. Her films include LANCE, Robin Williams: Come Inside My Mind, Richard Pryor: Omit the Logic and Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired, which won two Emmy awards.

Judith Dwan Hallet is an American documentary filmmaker.

5B is a 2018 American documentary film directed by Dan Krauss and Paul Haggis about the efforts of a group of nurses and caregivers who opened the first AIDS ward in the world at San Francisco General Hospital and changed the way patients were cared for in the 1980s AIDS epidemic.

References

  1. A Walk to Beautiful releases from Film-releases.com. Retrieved on March 9, 2008.
  2. "A Walk to Beautiful". Archived from the original on 2007-12-12.
  3. Nova series:A walk to beautiful from Pbs.org. Retrieved on March 11, 2008.
  4. "Reviews". Metacritic . Retrieved March 9, 2008.
  5. Film review from Variety magazine. Retrieved on March 9, 2008.
  6. A Walk to Beautiful review from the Los Angeles Times . Retrieved on March 9, 2008.
  7. Healing Cultural Wounds from The New York Times. Retrieved on March 9, 2008.
  8. A Walk to Beautiful 2008 from Box Office Mojo. Retrieved on March 27, 2008.
  9. Awards from International Documentary Association. Retrieved on March 9, 2008.
  10. 'Walk to Beautiful' tops IDA awards from Variety.
  11. AWARDS | GOLDEN GATE AWARDS | San Francisco Film Festival Archived July 24, 2011, at the Wayback Machine .
  12. Cinema St Louis Archived 2008-03-04 at the Wayback Machine .
  13. News in 2007 | News | Denver Film Society at the Starz FilmCenter.