A healing, magnanimous Love story honoring our Integrity:
QUEST – The Truth Always Rises
“In Honor of Tim Moellering & All the MENTORS, TEACHERS, & COACHES that Help the Kids that Need It the Most”
A magnanimous Love story honoring our Integrity and Healing:
QUEST
The Truth Always Rises
“In Honor of Tim Moellering & all the MENTORS, TEACHERS, & COACHES that Help the Kids that Need It the Most”

A fearless true story of courage, faith & forgiveness

“Lying might get you what you want in the short run, but honesty will get you what you need in the long run.” – Tim Moellering
Forthright Radio
Healing requires going toward the truth and that can take time to face. At some point, the Truth Always Rises. Through the struggle, the power of love will come and shift everything. By the end of the movie, it should open a door to transformation and welcomes you to a more fruitful path of truth, empathy, health, and forgiveness.


Audience reaction at World Premiere in Germany:
Starring Dash Mihok (Ray Donovan), Lou Diamond Phillips (La Bamba), Lakeith Stanfield (Judas & the Black Messiah, Sorry to Bother You, Get Out…), Betsy Brandt (Breaking Bad) & Introducing Greg Kasyan (Netflix Original “Daybreak”)

What Lou Diamond Phillips says:
“Trust Your Struggle” – Debt (played by Lakeith Stanfield)

Audience Members from Mill Valley Film Festival explain why Hollywood is fearful:
“#1 Film on ZED’s Top 10 Movies of 2017” (posted by the Producers of #2 Good Time)

A Letter from A Juvenile Detention Center in Arkansas that Removed the Locks Off their Doors One Year Later
Jonathan Pickering

Tim taught in the Berkeley School District for 28 years until he passed away in 2011 from pancreatic cancer. In 2013, the City of Berkeley voted on a $5mm bond to build a grass baseball field on MLK Jr Way which they named in his honor.
Tim did not judge. He believed if a kid has at least one redeeming quality, then he or she is redeemable. Despite being meaner to Tim than anyone he ever knew, Tim shared unconditional love with Santi and taught by never breaking a promise. Tim didn’t think there was such thing as a bad kid, only a bad situation. He was a great listener and a committed mentor & coach who treated all his students and players the same – with kindness, trust, empathy, and integrity.
Tim Moellering Field is on MLK Jr. Way & Derby in Berkeley, California


The Power of Kindness
& Launch To Stanford
This unlikely friendship uncovered the astonishing — Santiago’s Quest for learning, healing, sharing, and caring. Without violence or conflict, he was able to channel his intensity, born from trauma, toward getting into college. He became an emancipated minor through the court, Student Body President of his high school and with good grades and hustle, he became a Quest Scholar (nonprofit that helps underserved and low-income youth get into college). After demonstrating an intense drive to succeed and dig deep, he was awarded financial aid to Stanford University.
In a safe, vibrant, creative atmosphere, he gained the tools and space to process his past and focus on a brighter future. Santiago studied, debated, and learned new truths and possibilities. With that confidence, the world continued to open up. In 2003, Santiago graduated from Stanford with a major in Economics, minor in Psychology and a 3.55 GPA.
WALL STREET – TO HOLLYWOOD – TO DETENTION CENTERS
After graduating, he moved to Los Angeles to pursue filmmaking where he met mentors like Haskell Wexler (Oscar winning cinematographer) while catering the Oscars for Wolfgang Puck. This inspired a greater vision, voice, and artist in him. Quest, continued — without a financial pillow to fall back on, and not yet earning the privilege to pursue the arts, he got an internship with a financial advisor, met a “Michael Jordan” of finance catering a party in Malibu, and left Hollywood for the fortunate opportunity of working on Wall Street. While in NYC, he learned from the homeless on Sundays and volunteered at the Administration for Children’s Services (foster care in NYC). When Tim died of pancreatic cancer in 2011, he reached even higher, wanting to pay back his debt and help troubled youth – face their truth – and take action. After Quest was rejected by every agent and producer Santiago approached, with zero filmmaking experience, he sold the house Tim bought with him, produced and directed Quest. A script he originally wrote with Tim 10 years prior. Quest stands as a living tribute not only to Tim but to all the beautiful mentors, teachers, and coaches who are committed to saving those who are struggling and restoring their ability to dream for a better day. Tim lived as an example of integrity, as he promised; with courage, humility, and empathy.


This is the house Santiago and Tim bought together. Santi left Wall Street to be with Tim during his final year and worked full time on remodeling it with his own hands. Santi sold it in 2014 in order to create QUEST. Tim never broke a promise to Santi. Before Tim passed, Santi promised he would make Quest in Tim’s honor. Quest is the completion of that promise. Please watch the Eulogy from January 2011 at the bottom of this page.


“All of us struggle. It is only when we share and embrace our struggles that we can collaborate on a newer, bigger and more important Quest toward a safer world. But we all have our own Quest to get there. We cannot change anyone else other than ourselves. We do that by focusing on our shadows and privileges and bringing those to light so we can be a source of light for others. The only thing we can control in life is what we give. We cannot control what we receive.” -Santiago Rizzo

“There’s no such thing as a bad kid. Only a bad situation.” – Tim Moellering
“Every child is born as a blank slate – a beautiful blank canvas where anything and everything is possible when we have love, compassion, sharing, and truth. Many of us had to inherit a negative energy that was no fault of our own which we then perpetuate by acting out in unhealthy ways. When we let go of the hate and resentment — when we forgive — we create space for love. Love is the only energy that can heal.”

Dylan Mattingly was one of Tim Moellering’s students and ballplayers. He wrote all the original score for Quest at just 23 years old. One of the most powerful elements of the movie is the music he wrote, some of which he literally wrote from outside Tim’s garage (which was also the house we filmed out of, the house Tim died in, and the house Santiago used to live in with him). When Dylan was a senior in high school, Tim used to tell Santi that Dylan would be one of the world’s most influential composers. Tim had impeccable taste in music and after watching Quest, I think you will agree that he wasn’t just saying that. Below are a few videos from rehearsal with Dylan in the Member’s section. Please join us.

“Your pain can be the greatest teacher and gift. It is the unexpected and valuable pathway out. You must trust it and have faith. It WILL get better and there is a future beyond your past. When we can accept our discomfort, we can let go and release it, by no longer being a victim to it. Instead we can empower. Light and love suddenly appear where it was not possible before. This is why the first frames of the movie have Mills running with the birds flying away. This is what the movie builds toward.
Let the pain humble you to the release. The truth will eventually rise and set you free.”





Thaden School screened to their 7th and 9th graders. After the screening, we talked about how understanding the pain someone else might be living in helps us empathize instead of judge and with empathy we can help open up gateways to a better future. We discussed privilege as safety and love and how those of us with it now have a responsibility to share with those of us that don’t yet get it. The kids acting out likely have a struggle we don’t yet know about (and can’t speak about).
After feedback from the students, parents were very thankful to the administration. I believe it’s time we stop sheltering children from the reality of what other children go through. When we do this, the children with the gift of love from healthier families, FEEL and therefore empathize with the child they would normally be fearful of and isolate. With new understanding of they can step out of fear and come to the rescue with love.

My favorite part of the movie is being of service and seeing the kids shift! They begin to recognize the ways in which they push people away and can begin their Quest of empowerment by not being a victim anymore, and begin taking responsibility for their actions, therefore healing themselves and others while building toward a brighter future. I have a dream that one day these detention centers can become healing centers that produce of the most powerful healers our world has ever seen! These kids have been through the worst pain and trauma. They are our world’s greatest gifts because they have the potential to bring the darkest shadows to the brightest light.








