Kim White lived only 32 years, but she knew a movie about her life couldn’t be short.

“When I met with her, she said, ‘I want to do my story big,’” said Dan Davis, the director of “Breaking Into Beautiful,” a documentary about the Utah influencer who shared every step of her six-year battle with cancer on Instagram, up until her death on Feb. 14, 2020.

“I don’t think she knew what that meant, entirely. And I don’t think I knew what that meant, entirely, until I started to dig into her story,” Davis said from the Farmington offices of his production company, Stiry. “Then she started to uncover parts of her story with us, and what that meant was a feature film.”

“Breaking Into Beautiful” made its debut Jan. 3 on the streaming service of the Provo-based distributor Angel Studios, known for promoting family-friendly and faith-based content.

White was diagnosed with adrenocortical carcinoma, a rare and aggressive cancer, in March 2014 — when the cancer caused a premature end to a pregnancy at 18 weeks. Kim and her husband, Treagan, were planning for a little boy to join them and their daughter, Hensleigh, in their Kaysville home.

When she was diagnosed, Kim was told she would have two or three months to live. The movie shows how she decided to fight back hard, with aggressive treatments — including a liver operation in 2017 that she and her doctor referred to as “the Hail Mary,” as well as four infusions of the anti-cancer drug Keytruda.

White started documenting her cancer fight on Instagram. In the documentary, she says she did it in part because it was easier than sending texts and emails to all of her friends and relatives. At her death, she had gained some 124,000 Instagram followers.

Davis called White “a pioneer” for the way she shared her cancer fight. Before her, he said, “nobody was putting their health journeys on Instagram and social media” that way.

Davis said his production crew watched hundreds of hours of footage that White and her family shot at practically every stage of her treatment.

“There are just these beautiful and heartbreaking pieces of footage, and photos, that she had,” Davis said. “A lot of it was hard to watch, and hard to see because of how much pain and turmoil and trauma that she had been through. But it was beautiful because it existed.”

Davis had heard about White’s story — an employee pointed him to the Instagram account — but he connected with her through a mutual acquaintance: Dan Reynolds, the frontman for the rock band Imagine Dragons.

Davis’ company had worked with Reynolds on a short film to promote his nonprofit, the Tyler Robinson Foundation. Kim and Treagan White had attended one of the foundation’s galas in Las Vegas in 2019 — about a year before she died. She saw the short film and approached Davis.

“I always felt like hers was a story that I needed to tell, but I had never met her and never talked to her,” Davis said. “So it was pretty amazing to meet in that fashion, and have her just watch one of our films and then say, ‘I’ve been looking for someone to tell my story.’”

Reynolds was an early champion of White, and performed a solo acoustic concert in July 2014 to raise money to pay her medical bills. In February 2015, White was backstage at Ellen Degeneres’ talk show when Imagine Dragons performed.

Another celebrity who befriended White was Chris Harrison, the former host of ABC’s “The Bachelor” and “The Bachelorette” franchises. White met Harrison on the same trip to Hollywood when she was backstage at Ellen Degeneres’ show. She was a fan of “The Bachelor,” and he made it a point to invite her to that season’s “After the Rose” post-finale show — and got her a front-row seat every time she could attend.

Reynolds and Harrison are seen briefly in Davis’ documentary. Both attended White’s funeral and the “celebration of life” dance held the night before. Harrison is shown speaking on camera briefly outside her funeral.

Davis conducted the movie’s main interview with Kim White in October 2019. A few hours later, she was rushed to the emergency room because a tumor was closing off the airway to her lungs.

“It was a little scary, to be honest,” Davis said of that interview. “She was coughing a lot, and we were really worried about her. … She decided, ‘I’m getting up, I’m getting ready, I’m going to do this.’ … As a documentarian, you want those raw moments, but you don’t want to have anything that scary.”

Davis said getting the movie finished hit many hurdles. The lockdowns from the COVID-19 pandemic began just a month after White’s death. Also, many of her Instagram posts featured popular songs, and getting the music licenses took time. (One song in the film, “Disappear,” was recorded by musician Aja Volkman, Reynolds’ now-ex-wife, who wrote the song specifically for White.)

One question that “Breaking Into Beautiful” explores is why, out of thousands of stories of cancer diagnoses and fights, Kim White’s battle resonated with so many people. Davis said the answer is White herself.

“Kim just had these kind eyes, welcoming eyes,” Davis said. “She was a fierce, competitive, driven person, and you just could see that, even through her social media.”

With her cancer diagnosis, Davis said, “people want to know what that’s like, because they have loved ones or friends or acquaintances that are going through a cancer battle, but they have no idea, really, what it’s like. And Kim told you exactly what it was like … and she didn’t hold anything back.”

Democratic state lawmakers are again pushing a proposal to restrict rent hikes across Washington.

Despite the rent cap bill’s dramatic failure last session, backers say its prospects this year are better given new lawmakers, revamped legislative committees and growing public support. The road to final passage, however, could still be tough.

Rep. Emily Alvarado, D-Seattle, prefiled a “rent stabilization” bill in the House on Thursday. It is similar to where the plan left off last year. 

The bill includes a 7% cap on yearly rent increases for existing tenants, with some exceptions, including buildings operated by nonprofits and residential construction that is 10 years old or less. It also requires landlords to give 180 days notice before an increase of 3% or more and limits some move-in and deposit fees.

“People are suffering, and I don’t know how anyone comes back to the legislative session and doesn’t want to support relief,” said Sen. Yasmin Trudeau, D-Tacoma, who will sponsor the legislation in the Senate.

Supporters say the proposal would help tenants and alleviate homelessness, but opponents say a rent cap could only worsen Washington’s housing shortage by disincentivizing new development.

Democratic leaders said Thursday that the proposal will likely be heard quickly in the House after the session kicks off next week but could move slowly in the Senate where it died last year. 

Trudeau said the new makeup of the chamber and the membership of key committees could be in the bill’s favor. Last year,  supporters blamed moderate Democrats on committees like Ways and Means and Housing for killing the bill. Two of those moderates — Sens. Mark Mullet and Kevin Van De Wege — did not run for reelection last year and will no longer be in the Senate. 

Trudeau also said that because the policy is being named early as a priority for their caucus, it will give lawmakers more time to consider it. 

“We’re still going to have conflict, just hopefully not as dramatic as last year,” she said. 

Senate Majority Leader Jamie Pedersen, D-Seattle, told reporters Thursday that he believes his caucus is ready to support the bill, but that it would take passing other legislation to increase housing supply and improve affordability. 

In the House, the outlook is more certain. “We passed it off the floor in the House last year, and we will pass it off the floor this year,” House Speaker Laurie Jinkins, D-Tacoma, said.

The bill is sure to cause some heavy debate.

Last year, it had support from affordable housing advocates, tenants and labor unions. 

Michele Thomas, at the Washington Low Income Housing Alliance, said stabilizing rents is essential to help prevent evictions and homelessness. 

“I think lawmakers understand how much rising rents are contributing to housing instability, to homelessness, and to our state’s eviction crisis,” Thomas said.

Among those against the proposal are business groups, landlords and developers. 

Sean Flynn, board president and executive director at the Rental Housing Association of Washington, an industry group, criticized the idea, saying it would drive developers out of the state and lead to less home construction. 

“The fundamental problem that we have in our housing market is a lack of supply,” Flynn said. “This chokes off supply.”

Instead of a cap on all rents, Flynn said the Legislature should try to target tenants who need assistance most and specific landlords who use predatory rent increases without cause. 

One idea that has support from Republicans is creating a tenant assistance program that would give rental assistance vouchers to low-income tenants who may need help paying rent during a given month. Rep. Sam Low, R-Lake Stevens, is sponsoring that bill. 

House Minority Leader Drew Stokesbary, R-Auburn, told reporters Thursday his caucus is working on similar proposals with a more targeted approach to helping tenants. 

Stokesbary and Senate Minority Leader John Braun, R-Centralia, said their members likely will not support a rent cap policy this session. Stokesbary said he understands the short-term relief of the proposal but that the state ultimately needs more housing.

“In the long-run, this is a much worse deal for renters,” he said.  

Braun said lawmakers should find ways to make permitting easier and increase available land for home construction. He said there is “no quick solution” to the state’s housing and homelessness crisis.

But supporters of the rent cap bill push back on the idea that solely building more housing will solve the state’s problems.

Thomas said lawmakers have put a lot of emphasis in recent years on increasing the supply of homes and alleviating homelessness, but they have not passed legislation to help tenants struggling to keep their homes. Failing to do so will only result in higher levels of eviction and homelessness, Thomas said. 

“Rent stabilization stands alone,” she said. “Each of these issues are important, and the Legislature needs to address the entire housing ecosystem.”