SMILE PINKI shown with The Final Inch
Oscar Winner!
Directed by Megan Mylan
United States, 39 Minutes, Bhojpuri & Hindi with English Subtitles
Documentary/Short
SAT APR 18, 4:45pm, The Grand Theater; SUN APR 19, 2:30pm
Filmmaker Megan Mylan in attendance
Special Film Sponsor: Willamette Ear, Nose, Throat & Facial Plastic Surgery, LLP
Sharing in the desire to better themselves, their children, and their community, both locally and globally, the physicians, nurses and staff of Willamette Ear, Nose, Throat & Facial Plastic Surgery have participated in 6 missions to Cuba, Vietnam, Brazil and Peru. Over 500 patients were seen in clinics and over 40 surgeries performed on each trip. Everyone has a skill that can help on a medical mission. From surgery to assisting patients and families, anything helps, providing kindness, compassion and hope.Director and former Salem resident Megan Mylan returns to the Salem Film Festival with the laurels of an Academy Award for best documentary short. This "real-world fairy tale" embraces the emotional journey of Pinki and Ghutaru, two children in rural India born desperately poor and with cleft lips. The simple surgery that can cure them remains a dream until they meet Pankaj, a social worker traveling from village to village, gathering patients for a hospital that provides free surgery to thousands each year. Told in a vibrant cinema-verité style, the film follows its two wide-eyed protagonists on a journey from isolation to embrace.
Filmography: Lost Boys of Sudan (03)
Awards: Academy Award Winner for Best Documentary Short
Megan Mylan (Director)
Megan Mylan has worked in a variety of capacities on documentary films and is currently directing Raça, a film on the struggle for racial equality in Brazil Recently named a Guggenheim Fellow, Megan also directed Batidania: Power in the Beat, about an Afro-Brazilian youth percussion group from Rio de Janeiro fighting drug violence and racism through music. She was Post Production Supervisor for Frances Reid and Deborah Hoffmann's Long Night's Journey Into Day, 2000 Academy Award nominee and winner of the Sundance Grand Jury Prize. Before beginning her film work, Megan worked with Ashoka, an international development non-profit, in the U.S. and Brazil. She has Masters' degrees in Journalism and Latin American Studies from the University of California at Berkeley and a Bachelor's from Georgetown's School of Foreign Service.
