Excerpt from an article originally published in the Washington Post.
Does the arc of the moral universe really bend toward justice, as American abolitionist Theodore Parker famously said?
It didn’t look that way when Paul Farmer, a young medical student, first visited Haiti in 1983. Haiti was impoverished, racked with preventable diseases and lacking in the most basic treatment facilities.
But Farmer began to bend that arc with two friends, activist Ophelia Dahl and physician Jim Yong Kim. They started to push the international community to care about medical treatment in developing nations.
Their efforts — and their sometimes breathtaking triumphs — are the subject of a new documentary by Kief Davidson and Pedro Kos, “Bending the Arc.” Using still photos, historical footage and interviews, the film follows the trio as they transform from inexperienced idealists to international health advocates.