Ahoy, squirts! Quint here. My first surprise of SXSW 2015 arrived in a beautiful, heartfelt and inspiring documentary called A Brave Heart: The Lizzie Velasquez Story.
That's Lizzie up there. You've probably seen her before if you've been on any social media in the last three or four years. When she was 17 a video was uploaded to Youtube calling her the Ugliest Woman In the World and what could have been and should have been a soul-breaking moment for this teenage girl born with a mystery affliction instead was the seed for what would become a powerful force of good in this world.
I call this documentary the anti-Dear Zachary. Dear Zachary is one of the most amazing docs I've ever seen, but it's super brutal and as such isn't the easiest movie in the world to recommend. A Brave Heart, on the other hand, gets you crying tears of happiness, not of deepest, darkest despair, so I'm happy to have something that works as well, but in an uplifting way that I can throw in front of people.
While the doc might ultimately be about Lizzie's quest to get anti-bullying/cyberbullying legislation enacted, the real takeaway is Lizzie as a person. Ever since her TED Talk on the subject put her in the fight the thing that is the clearest about her is that she's just a kind soul with a passion for helping people. Seeing her interact with her family and with the people she's touched by blasting her positive energy out into the world had a pretty profound effect on me, actually. Lizzie speaks for everyone who ever was made to feel that they were lesser and when you realize that pretty much includes every single human on the planet in some way, shape or form (even the ones doing the bullying) you just kind of scratch your head at how we can be so cruel.
And I'm counting myself in that. I may not be the bullying type, but I have said mean things in my life. Almost always in the form of a joke, which in my mind means I'm trying to take away some of the power of the subject I'm joking about (be it racism, sexism, etc), but I am human. I have lashed out at people before, I have said things in jest without context and while I don't believe I'll ever be the most PC guy in this world, I do want to make an effort to not make people feel excluded.
This movie underlined what I believe are my own shortcomings as well as my own strengths. I'm an incredibly empathetic person, so it's not hard for me to put myself into others' shoes and live life with the Do Unto Others rule always in the back of my mind. Lizzie's journey in this doc made it even easier as she gives talks about our individual feelings of self worth. I know I've been conscious of being a bigger guy and worried if people make snap judgments about me, but much like Lizzie I mostly don't even think about much anymore. I've made a lot of good friends, I have a hell of a job and I'm happy with the person I am and have grown more and more confident in just being that person as the years have gone on.
Jesus, it sounds like I'm the hype man for a motivational speaker, doesn't it? Don't worry, this thing isn't preachy, it's not trying to manipulate you into some kind of fake sympathy for this person... it's only putting Lizzie front and center and letting her personality do the rest.
You'll feel like a million bucks when the credits start rolling on this one. And hopefully you'll come out of it like I did... wanting to be a better person. Wanting to be more consciously nice to people not for any other reason than to little by little take some of the dickishness out of this world.
If I were King of the World I'd want this to be required watching in every middle school in America. Kids are fucking cruel, but not because they're assholes (some of them are, let's be honest, but not most). Sometimes they just lack the empathy necessary to realize what they're doing has real consequences on the well-being of their targets.
In a generation that's allowed to be both simultaneously connected to and detached from the world around them they need a movie like A Brave Heart. Sometimes all it takes is having something remind you not to be a dick and that's definitely this movie.
I don't think the flick has distribution yet, but I'm sure it'll get out there. Seek it out!
-Eric Vespe
”Quint”
quint@aintitcool.com
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