Last Minutes with Oden: A Powerful Elegy on Love, Loss and Grief
Last Minutes with Oden is a deeply engaging, extremely heart-wrenching 6-minute documentary short film directed and edited by Eliot Rausch, in association with PhosPictures and Uber Content. The film was named Best Documentary and Best Video at the 2010 Vimeo Awards, chosen from over 6500 film and video submissions.
Last Minutes with Oden tells a story about Jason Wood (Woody), an ex-convict who is saying a final farewell to his best friend, of the man’s last minutes with his dog before he has to have it euthanized for health reasons. The documentary is a beautiful elegy that calls attention to certain heartbreaking moments most of us experience, which is an incredibly powerful reminder of the importance of family and friendships in all our lives.
Naki’o is a heart-warming documentary short film directed by Aaron Pendergast in association with New District Productions, which tells the heroic story of a courageous abandoned puppy. When Naki’o was a small puppy, he was deserted during a frigid Nebraska winter in the basement of a foreclosed home along with his mother. The drastically low winter temperatures and starvation took the mother’s life; but Naki’o, despite being frozen in a puddle of ice water, miraculously survived. His survival, however, came at a tragic cost: by the time he was rescued by Colorado’s All Aboard Animal Rescue, Naki’o had lost all four paws and the tip of his tail to frostbite.
As soon as Christie Pace, a veterinary technician who lives in Colorado Springs, saw Naki’o's picture, she knew that she had fallen in love with him. “When I got him he was 8 weeks, 4 pounds, and he was missing patches of fur because he had mange. But, he was just such a happy guy,” Pace said. While she knew Naki’o was missing all four paws, as well as part of his tail and nose, she also believed that she would be able to find a solution down the road.
Thanks to Pace, the wounds healed into stumps. Although his lack of paws did not seem too much of a hurdle when Naki’o was just a small puppy, trouble began as he grew bigger and Naki’o found himself unable to support his own weight with his stumps. Pace raised money to pay for prosthetic devices for Naki’o by organizing fundraisers. She then contacted OrthoPets, a US company that specializes in customizing artificial limbs and orthotic braces for animals, to create prosthetics for Naki’o. When they saw Naki’o, however, the animal hospital decided to treat him for free.
Two prosthetic devices were attached to his hind legs. Some months later, prosthetic legs were similarly fitted to his front stumps. Although Naki’o's life began in a state of heart-wrenching tragedy, he’s now a happy, high-spirited dog, who is able to run, jump, play games and even go swimming.
The World’s First Bionic Dog Steps Up to the Challenge
The Online Blue Ribbon
