Supermen of Malegaon (2012)

Made during seven months in 2008 but not properly released until this year, Supermen of Malegaon will go to the history as one of the best and most heart-warming documentaries ever made - and even better, it's connected deeply to the world weird cinema culture me and many others enjoy so much. It's not one of those hip, shallow, funny anecdotes docs that's been flooding the market during the last years, this is something much more closer to reality, something that's for real - as real as a documentary can be, because we all know those are often closer to fiction than the normal Joe can imagine. It's all about telling a good story.

Supermen of Malegaon tells the story of filmmaker Shaikh Nasir and his team of local talents in the poor, dirty city of Malegaon in the north of India. He has just hired weaver Shafique to play Superman in a new action-comedy-adventure where our hero is fighting pollution, drugs and all the other things that's destroying our world. With a budget of a couple of hundred dollars and a fantastic amount of imagination and enthusiasm they go on a journey to make their dreams come true, from the depressed screenwriter who's been fighting for 15 years to go to Mumbai to a director that refuses to leave his town - and in-between them the quiet, shy hero with a Superman-suit that gets more and more worn for each day of fighting, jumping and slapstick!

With a simple digital video camera and an energy, that we all should envy these supermen (and a couple of superwomen also), we follow them in their quest to make a local blockbuster. It would have been an easy task of make fun of these heroes, but director Faiza Ahmad Khan walked the line perfectly and delivers a touching and dramatic film about passion and love. Instead of laughing a the director when he accidentally drops his only camera into a dirty lake we're terrified, because we want him to finish this movie, for him and his team's sake. Khan never shies away with the camera, and there's both hard times and happy times during the making of Malegaon ka Superman - not everyday is easy and money is always a problem, but nothing is stopping them.

In the middle is the adorable, soft-spoken, gentle and slightly shy leading man Shafique, a man who can't weight more than 50 kilos. His dream is to play a hero and he gives everything in his performance, from wild stunts to dancing. The whole movie is sprinkled with quotes and dreams and it's impossible to dislike a guy that willingly does this and still is so happy. He died one year after the movie was shot, in cancer, but his dream became true: everyone is calling him Superman and he truly became a real, true star.

As a filmmaker myself, sometimes, I'm so impressed by the creativity of Shaikh Nasir and his team. They make a camera crane from an old wagon, uses an old bicycle for wild tracking shots, doing their own green screen effects behind a barn etc. A lot of spoiled Swedish indie-filmmakers should watch and learn from this documentary.

The only complaint I have is that it's too short. I could have watched an hour more, because I love these people so much.

Easily one of the best movies this year and it's something you have to watch at once!