THE CANINE CONDITION: FACING A BROKEN SYSTEM Documentary Short To Compete At The 19th Annual LA Femme International Film Festival

"THE CANINE CONDITION: FACING A BROKEN SYSTEM", a documentary series episode, written and directed by Jacqueline Piñol and co-produced with Jonny Blu, will compete for Best Documentary Short at the 19th Annual LaFemme which will take place at the Regal Cinemas in Downtown Los Angeles, International Film Festival, October 19-22, 2023.

Piñol and Blu, both animal lovers based in Los Angeles, were shaken when they happened across a social media post from a small town in Georgia named Dublin. Coincidentally, they had recently adopted a rescue dog named Dublin and the post revealed the tragic truth about how beautiful, healthy animals were being euthanized because the shelters there were maxed out. The shelter staff were emotionally overwhelmed and desperate to shine a light on this growing problem which is happening all across our nation.

Piñol recalls that the follow up to reading that post took her and Blu's life in an unexpected new direction when they decided to visit the Laurens County Humane Society in Georgia. "They had launched a social media campaign called SAVE THE 200, pleading for help at the Dublin shelter where they were over capacity by 200 dogs," she says. "The Department of Agriculture had given them 30 days to find homes for those dogs or else start euthanizing them."

Once there, both she and Blu fell in love with a dog named Huckleberry and they realized they could no longer ignore this tragic situation. The two decided to step up and shine a spotlight on this problem and started traveling to similar shelters across the country that euthanize innocent animals instead of preventing overpopulation.

These travels gave birth to The Canine Condition documentary series and a subsequent podcast, which is hosted on Spotify.

"As we traveled the country, animal lovers welcomed us with open arms and this is where our true mission was born," she exclaims. "We discovered that even if people had different cultural, social, religious, and political backgrounds, they shared one binding factor: their willingness to unite and lend a hand to save human's best friends."

The short has already been playing the festival circuit to great acclaim; most recently it received the award for Best Documentary Short at the Atlanta Women's Film Festival in October and Best Series Episode and Best Editing at the Oregon Documentary Film Festival in Portland this past June.

THE CANINE CONDITION will screen on October 20, 4 PM at the Regal Cinemas,1000 W Olympic Blvd in Downtown Los Angeles. Tickets can be purchased by visiting the LaFemme International Film Festival website at https://lafemme.eventive.org/welcome.

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