What started five years ago as a donation program between sisters cities - one in B.C., the other in the Dominican Republic - ended up as a full-scale humanitarian effort when the deadly earthquake hit neighbouring Haiti in January of 2010.

A local video production company, Digital Village Productions, started out chronicling the efforts of non-profit charity Kids Explore International in Williams Lake to provide aid to sister city Sosua.

But the earthquake provided a dramatic twist in what otherwise have been a heart-warming tale about an aid program, and that's when director and cameraman Gary Moore found himself filming scenes of utter devastation visited on the already-impoverished Caribbean nation.

"It started out with one shipping container full of supplies," said Moore, who donated his time for the project. "Then it turned into a full emergency medical response with doctors and nurses."

The documentary starts out detailing the relatively straightforward donation program, launched by Kids Explore International directors Glen Lahey and his wife Debbie.

They convince Williams Lake municipal council to adopt Sosua as a sister city and set about filling the first shipping container with an overflowing of donations from local residents.

Grateful Dominicans can't thank enough the Canadians who arrive en masse to deliver the varied supplies - everything from toys to crutches to computers - to what seems a colourful tropical paradise. "People have to bring in their own supplies when they have an operation," marvels Lahey, during a visit to a hospital. "So they need everything, the works."

The film contrasts the cold and grey of Canada - it's winter in Williams Lake when the first container is loaded - with the ocean, beaches and resorts of the seaside city of Sosua.

One touching scene is the visit by Lahey to a local orphanage for severely children known as "throwaway kids."

But even their needs take a back seat to the acute medical emergencies generated by the earthquake - the last half of the documentary takes a grim turn through the shattered city of Port-au-Prince.

It's hard to find hope in the scenes of utter devastation - rotting corpses, pancaked buildings, filthy shantytowns and the blank stares of some of the survivors.

But Hand-delivered finds it in the efforts of a 15-person medical team, assembled by Kids Explore International, from volunteers in western Canada.

Dispatched to an overloaded hospital on Jimini near the Haitian border, the team finds itself dealing with horrific injuries and multiple amputations, in conditions that most Canadian medical professionals cannot comprehend.

The documentary ends with a firm affirmation from all involved that hand-delivering humanitarian aid from B.C. to the Dominican Republic will continue long after the credits have rolled.

Watch the full documentary right here :

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Photos from the Project :