From 1995 to 1998, director Richard Kotuk documented Travis Jefferies, a young boy in the South Bronx living with AIDS. For 14 hours every day, Travis is tube-fed liquid nutrients because he can no longer eat. His life revolves around managing painful side effects, countless medications, and hospital visits. When Kotuk first meets Travis, at age seven, he is already beginning to recognize the frailty of his existence and the limitations imposed by his illness. But Travis’s determination to live is radiant and only strengthened by physicians, pharmacists, neighbors, cousins, and his caregiving grandmother, who are all unwilling to give up on him. Kotuk’s camera is unflinching, bearing witness to Travis’s physical pain and his mental fortitude. This Peabody Award–winning film became an integral part of Full Frame’s history in 1998, when it won the Grand Jury Award during the first edition of the festival, when it was called the DoubleTake Documentary Film Festival.  KL

Q&A following screening.