Dr. Rick Hodes Presentation

Since he first came to the festival in 2009 with the film that featured him, Dr. Rick Hodes has had a special relationship with Mountainfilm. That documentary, Making the Crooked Straight, followed his efforts to help children in Ethiopia whose spines had been twisted by spinal tuberculosis and other diseases.

The film won the Moving Mountains Prize that year and instead of putting the $5,000 in prize money (which had been supplemented by an anonymous audience member) into a general fund to support his work, Hodes decided that he would use it to heal a single child. The recipient was a thirteen-year old girl named Mieraf who he brought last year to Telluride where she spoke about how Mountainfilm had “saved her life.”

Also at last year’s festival, he encountered Prudence Mabhena, the star of Music by Prudence who was born severely handicapped in Zimbabwe but has been blessed with a remarkable singing voice. Once he met her, he went to work and helped arrange major surgery that he said, “saved her life.”

This year, we can’t guarantee he will find more lives to save, but we do know that he will speak about his work in Ethiopia and, in keeping with this year’s theme of Awareness into Action, will talk about how the Mountainfilm audience can help him broaden the important work he is doing. He will also be part of a Coffee Talk on Monday.