Documentary about Owen Hart Foundation wins big at Monaco International Film Festival
By Eric Volmers (Calgary Herald)
Posted December 11th, 2014

No matter how uplifting it may become, the story of former professional wrestler Owen Hart’s legacy will always have a sad beginning.
So telling it requires revisiting some painful days for Martha Hart, Owen’s widow and the founder of the Owen Hart Foundation.
Her husband fell to his death in 1999, after a stunt went wrong during a pay-per-view event in Kansas for the World Wrestling Federation (now World Wrestling Entertainment). It’s a heart-wrenching incident and the starting point for Martha Hart’s new documentary, The Owen Hart Foundation: A Look Back.

“It was an emotional journey to create the documentary,” says Hart, in a phone interview from her home in Calgary. “It’s sort of like shrapnel in your body that you can’t remove. You can live with it most days but it’s always there and it can still hurt you. But I definitely have come a long ways since the early days and recovered and been successful in my life and moved in a very positive direction.”
Hart founded the Owen Hart Foundation in 2000 to honour her late husband. It has raised more than $3-million over 15 years through various programs designed to help those with “limited resources and unlimited potential.”
The triumph-from-tragedy angle is at the heart of the foundation — which will hold fundraising shows featuring comedian Dane Cook on Saturday — and the focus of Hart’s 18-minute documentary.

Initially envisioned as a four to five-minute video to promote the foundation’s 15th anniversary, Hart took the helm and decided to tell the origin stories of the foundation. Last week, the film opened the Monaco International Film Festival, which focuses on non-violent movies. The film ended up taking four awards home, including best short documentary film, best short documentary director for Hart, best film editing in short documentary for first-time, 18-year-old editor Wes Beiko and the Humanitarian Angel Film Award.
The documentary will be screened on Saturday prior to Dane Cook’s 6:30 p.m. and 10 p.m. shows at the Jubilee Auditorium.

“We’ve had this great win and we plan on entering into other film festivals as well,” Hart says. “We met quite a few different producers and directors from all over the world when we were at the international film festival in Monaco. We had two producers and one screenwriter approach me and said they thought it could be a feature film. We want to explore that possibility. It’s really taken on a life of its own.”
The film covers the tragic accident, but the main focus is the formation of the foundation. Well-known Calgarians, including Mayor Naheed Nenshi and W. Brett Wilson, are interviewed about the impact of the charity, as are Martha and Owen’s children, Oje and Athena.

Owen Hart had a successful career as a professional wrestler, mostly in the WWE, and was the youngest of the 12 children of legendary trainer and promoter Stu Hart. Bret Hart, a world champion wrestler, was his older brother.
While his in-ring character was often villainous, his fellow wrestlers have painted him as a kind and considerate family man in real life.

“That’s the beauty of the Owen Hart Foundation,” says Hart. “It truly does reflect the spirit of Owen and his kind and giving nature. That for me was the main goal and drive behind establishing the Owen Hart foundation. I wanted people to know that a really great person was lost but from true adversity and tragedy something positive could come out of it as well.”

Dane Cook will appear at the Southern Jubilee Auditorium on Saturday for two shows, at 6:30 and 10 p.m. It is a benefit for the Owen Hart Foundation. For tickets visit ticketmaster.ca. The Owen Hart Foundation: A Look Back will screen before both performances.

evolmers@calgaryherald.com