Marwencol

At first, MARWENCOL looks like a sad but conventional trip through the life of Mark Hogancamp. Beaten brutally outside a bar in New York, Mark's brain was essentially altered after the beating. His lawyer tells us about the incident, and we see Mark as a severely damaged, retarded man. And then the film changes, and we learn that Mark was a real asshole, a drunk who probably started the fight (not to say that he deserved his punishment). He was a drawer in his old life, but this is a Mark Hogancamp who is now a different person, and reminisces on his old self (who he cannot remember) sadly, telling us that he doesn't even undestand such violence. He is however, a damaged person with fragmented memories and sad obsessions. In his first appartment after the incident, he pined after the woman next door (married and with two children). The woman and even her husband understand and pity Mark, but Mark sees the woman very clearly as something he probably knows he will never be able to have again. And then the film shifts. Mark, in order to deal with his personal tragedy, constructs a world in which he can live comfortably. He begins to collect action figure dolls, dresses them, names them after people he knows, and photographs them incessantly. He creates the town of Marwencol, with himself as a sturdy officer in a WWII town. He parades his figures (dead ringers for their real-life counterparts) around town on the road in a little jeep, he gives them all perfect detail. We see in Mark a man who has created a world that he can control, because he cannot control the world in reality. And then the film shifts. Mark is discovered by another photographer, and his work is put out into the open. Mark's images are beautiful and expressive, serious and non-comical works of his mind. MARWENCOL itself is a very good film about a very interesting subject. Although it is occasionally manipulative in its chosen paths, it is an interesting portrait of a man and his art.
Marwencol: ★★★1/2