Mark Hogancamp tries to rebuild his life in a carefully constructed alternate reality(photo by Tom Putnam)
MARWENCOL (Jeff Malmberg, 2010)
IndieScreen
285 Kent Ave. at South Second St.
January 14-20, $10-$12, 8:00
347-227-8030
www.indiescreen.us
www.marwencol.com
Named Best Documentary at numerous film festivals across the country, MARWENCOL offers a surprising look inside the creative process and the fine line that exists between art and reality. On April 8, 2000, Mark Hogancamp was nearly beaten to death outside a bar in his hometown of Kingston, New York. He spent nine days in a coma and more than a month in the hospital before being released, suffering severe brain damage that has left his memory a blur. To help put his life back together, he began using toys and dolls — Barbies, celebrity replicas, army men — to re-create his personal journey. He makes dolls of his friends and relatives, the people he works with, and others, constructing an alternate WWII-era universe he calls Marwencol, complete with numerous buildings and plenty of Nazis. He captures the detailed story in photographs that are not only fascinating to look at but that also help him figure out who he was and who he can be. This miniature three-dimensional world is reminiscent of the two-dimensional one carefully fashioned by outsider artist Henry Darger in his fifteen-thousand-page manuscript, The Story of the Vivian Girls, in What is known as the Realms of the Unreal, of the Glandeco-Angelinnian War Storm, Caused by the Child Slave Rebellion, which also features an alternate reality involving military battles set amid stunning artwork. Director, producer, and editor Jeff Malmberg makes no judgments about Hogancamp, and asks the same of the audience. In his first full-length film, Malmberg shares the compelling story of a deeply troubled, flawed man suddenly forced to begin again, using art and creativity to bring himself back to life. He speaks with Hogancamp’s mother, his old roommate, the prosecutor who handled his case, and others who are first seen proudly holding the doll Hogancamp made of them. And Malmberg doesn’t turn away from the more frightening aspects of Hogancamp’s daily existence. MARWENCOL is an unforgettable portrait of lost identity and the long road to redemption.
After making METHADONIA, which was selected for the 2005 New York Film Festival, Emmy Award-winning documentarian Michel Negroponte (JUPITER’S WIFE) did not want to make another movie about drug addiction. But when he was introduced to the intriguing story of Dimitri Mugianis, ibogaine, and West African shamanism, he couldn’t help himself. Leader of the hardcore band Leisure Class, Mugianis had gotten off heroin by using ibogaine, an experimental, natural hallucinogen that is illegal in the United States. Mugianis was so impressed with the treatment that he immediately became part of the underground network that dispenses the drug, helping others detox much the same way he did. Negroponte follows Mugianis as he treats patients in Mexico and Canada, even taking the hallucinogen himself so he can experience its mind-altering effects (and add a groovy dream sequence to the film). And when one treatment goes terribly wrong, Mugianis starts questioning his mission and heads to Gabon to meet with Bwiti shamans and learn more about ibogaine and its unique properties. Mugianis is a compelling subject: open, honest, and strong, he dominates the screen, holding nothing back as he wonders whether he has merely replaced one addiction with another. Negroponte’s droll, often humorous narration counterbalances Mugianis’s determined, aggressive manner. The director avoids talking-head experts, instead letting the compelling story play out on its own, taking him and the audience on a very different journey than he first imagined. I’M DANGEROUS WITH LOVE, named after a Leisure Class song, is a passionate look at addiction, rehabilitation, and one man’s intense dedication to help others. The film opens January 12 at the IFC Center, with Negroponte on hand for the 8:20 screenings tonight and tomorrow.