Marwencol

Jeff Malmberg’s documentary Marwencol, a prize-winner wherever it has screened, captures a bizarre true story of artful fantasy and fantastic art. In the World War II-era Belgian village of Marwencol, Nazi storm troopers have captured an American soldier. They string him up in the church and begin to slice his face and body with a dagger. Suddenly, the vicious attack is miraculously thwarted when a phalanx of sexy barmaids, led by heroic Anna, bursts in, guns blazing, killing the assailants and setting the captive free. The celebration later includes nude female wrestling down by the river.

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• Kingston (New York)
• Criminal Assault
• Crime and Law

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If all that sounds a little, well, out there, it is. The documentary shows that the meticulous town of Marwencol exists in Mark Hogancamp’s backyard in Kingston, New York. He created it as a form of therapy — physical and mental — after a vicious beating in 2001 rendered him without memory. Friends and family populate the town, all represented by Barbie and Ken dolls, exquisitely detailed down to the clips in the guns and the miniature orders in the knapsacks. Making up stories that parallel his own life, Hogancamp photographs them with equal precision and dreamlike reality.

In the film, when his photographs are discovered by the art world, Hogancamp, who created the fantasy world Marwencol as a safe place for himself, is forced to consider venturing back out into the real world. A real world, we might mention, that doesn’t have sexy, heroic barmaids killing assailants and then wrestling nude down by the river to celebrate. 7 p.m. Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays. Through December 18. 14 Pews, 800 Aurora. For information, call 281-888-9677 or visit www.14pews.org. $8.
Fridays-Sundays, 7:30 p.m. Starts: Dec. 10. Continues through Dec. 18, 2010