Activists Damn Near Die for African Poverty Flick

We're all familiar with those travel guidebooks with tantalizing titles such as Europe on $10 a Day. But in these inflationary times, how about making it across a continent for a paltry five American quarters per 24 hours? Even if that continent is the world's poorest?

Previewing this Sunday, August 14, at the Tivoli Theatre in St. Louis, Give a Damn? follows the relay team African travel efforts of five individuals—Dan Parris, Rob Lehr, David Peterka, Tim Peterka, and Tony Davis—between July and November of 2009. The main goal of the film is to highlight poverty around the world and stimulate discussion about how to best help solve it.

However, Parris, Lehr, and Peterka (David) unintentionally made headlines of a different sort when the plane they were in over Kenya crashed during an aerial footage filming leg August 1, 2009. Both the pilot and co-pilot of the plane perished, while Parris and Lehr were left to recover first at a Nairobi hospital and then in the U.S.

 

Tomorrow's St. Louis Filmmakers Showcase screening is the first preview showing. The filmmakers plan a regional tour in the next few months that will take them to Atlanta, Nashville, Memphis, Phoenix, Las Vegas, and other cities.

Parris was the most seriously hurt in the crash, requiring surgery and nine months of personal recovery time. Meanwhile, David Peterka is going a heroic step further, setting up a non-profit in Malawi that will provide a safe haven for local young girls who have been prostituted.

[Give a Damn?]