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Marwencol is a documentary about Mark Hogancamp, and the fantasy world he created after being severely beaten outside a bar. The attack cost him thirty-eight years of memories — he woke unable to write, unable to walk, unable to draw, with no memory of his wife, his military service, his friends. His response was to create a 1/6-scale replica of a WWII-era Belgian town in his backyard — Marwencol — in which Barbies and modified G.I. Joes representing him, his friends, his attackers, and everyone else in his life live together in a world he has perfect control over. They get married, battle the SS, travel in time. He photographs their stories, and the photographs are remarkable: dramatic, expressive, human.
This, then, is a movie (in part) about a perfect dedication to Art, stripped of any concern for what anyone else thinks. Mark emerges from the attack in a childlike state, and creates with the concentration and confidence of a child but the artistic sense (balance, composition, mood, drama) of an adult. It's about the power of the creative urge, which pushes up through dirt and asphalt and concrete to flower, and although there is much in his fantasy world that is troubling, wrenching, off-putting, it is also inspiring; it made me cry. I wish I had a tenth of his dedication, a fraction of his absolute artistic confidence. But the price he paid to get it, the loss and unmooring, oh, the price!
See Marwencol. It's amazing. (For Bostonians, it'll be at the Kendall Square Cinema through Thursday.) See more at marwencol.com.
Other moments from my day of adventure in the big city:
This, then, is a movie (in part) about a perfect dedication to Art, stripped of any concern for what anyone else thinks. Mark emerges from the attack in a childlike state, and creates with the concentration and confidence of a child but the artistic sense (balance, composition, mood, drama) of an adult. It's about the power of the creative urge, which pushes up through dirt and asphalt and concrete to flower, and although there is much in his fantasy world that is troubling, wrenching, off-putting, it is also inspiring; it made me cry. I wish I had a tenth of his dedication, a fraction of his absolute artistic confidence. But the price he paid to get it, the loss and unmooring, oh, the price!
See Marwencol. It's amazing. (For Bostonians, it'll be at the Kendall Square Cinema through Thursday.) See more at marwencol.com.
Other moments from my day of adventure in the big city:
- A trans pride march on Newbury Street, led by someone with absolutely no sense of pitch singing All I Want for Christmas Is My Civil Rights through a megaphone. It was pretty wonderful. I gave them the thumbs-up.
- Eating hot roasted nuts in Boston Common, watching the skaters go in circles and circles and circles on the Frog Pond.
- Taking the escalator up to Filene's Basement, and saying "Waitaminute."
- Crossing the Longfellow Bridge on foot after the movie, in the cold and the dark, and just breathing in the glittering skyline.
