WATERLOO — The co-writer, co-producer, screenwriter and songwriter of the documentary film “Saving Ana” and the documentary film song “Missing Children” has been considered for an Oscar — and he lives in Waterloo.
Dr. Dennis Walter Smith, a 2017 graduate of New York Chiropractic College, had his song and picture both considered for nomination for awards at the 96th annual Oscar Academy Awards, scheduled for March 11.
Even though neither was selected as a final nominee, the whole process was exciting for Smith.
“It has blown me away to see my name on that list, which also includes names like Bradley Cooper, Ben Affleck, Matt Damon and Denzel Washington,” he said in a phone interview.
A native of Philadelphia, Smith was in the acting and recording industry before joining his wife in graduating in 2017 from the former NYCC in Seneca Falls, now the Northeast College of Health Sciences. He began to work on a master’s degree in health care from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, but that was sidetracked soon after starting by the COVID-19 pandemic.
“In 2021, I went back into the entertainment industry. I wrote the song some 30 years ago while still living in Pennsylvania,” Smith said “In 1994, my ex-manager saw Jody Himebaugh on a Philadelphia news station talking abut his son, Mark Himebaugh, who had gone missing without a trace Nov. 25, 1991.
“My former manager was moved by the story and called me up to ask if I could write a song dedicated to the Mark Himebaugh Foundation. I responded yes and went to work.”
Smith said he thought the song came out so good that he “wanted the whole world to hear it.” So he released it on his own label, Vision Records.
He left the acting and recording artist world in 1997, but his desire to share the song widely and become a global anthem for missing and exploited children persisted.
In August 2021, he started soliciting film producers and directors who were creating films about missing children or child sex trafficking.
“I connected with a production company out of Virginia and basically co-wrote the film around the ‘Missing Children’ song,” Smith said. “That film was ‘Saving Ana’ and the rest, as they say, is history.”
His “Missing Children” song was entered into 94 film festivals around the world in 2023 and has won first place in about 60 of them, along with multiple awards in dozens of film festivals.
In “Saving Ana,” Smith plays a pastor who is outspoken against the LGBTQ community, not knowing his own teenage daughter is gay and got caught up in sex trafficking.
Smith wrote the music and lyrics to “Missing Children.” He also produced and performed the song.
“The song blew up and became part of the Adam Walsh posters that were in Walmarts. It seemed to be the perfect song for missing children awareness and also become an anthem,” Smith said.
While the movie and song both were considered for an Oscar nomination, Smith also was in the running for his acting role in the movie.
“I guess you could say that my work this year made it to the finals, but did not garnish the nomination as one of the five best actors, one of the 10 best pictures and one of the 10 best original songs,” he said.
Smith said he and his wife would like to open their own health care practice “because we love helping people, “but that is not going to happen in the very near future, he said.
“My gifts in entertainment we heaven sent. As a solo recording artist and actor in the early ‘90s, I believe it is time to charge after my dreams, now that my three sons are all adults,” Smith said. “Making it to the top of the film industry platform in three different categories my first time out as a creator has definitely changed things for me.”
