Marwencol

Marwencol is a documentary about the fantasy world of Mark Hogancamp. After being beaten into a brain-damaging coma by five men outside a bar, Mark builds a 1/6th scale model of a World War II-era town in his backyard. Mark dubs the town "Marwencol,” populates it with dolls representing his friends and family and creates life-like photographs detailing the town's many relationships and dramas. Playing in the town and photographing the action helps Mark to recover his hand-eye coordination and deal with the psychic wounds of the attack. When Mark and his photographs are discovered, a prestigious New York gallery sets up an art show. Suddenly Mark's homemade therapy is deemed "art", forcing him to choose between the safety of his fantasy life in Marwencol and the real world that he's avoided since the attack.

“Exactly the sort of mysterious and almost holy experience you hope to get from documentaries and rarely do, Jeff Malmberg’s Marwencol is something like a homegrown slice of Herzog oddness, complete with true-crime backfill and juicy metafictive upshot.” (Michael Atkinson, Village Voice)

A 2011 Spirit Award nominee for Best Documentary and the Aveeno Truer than Fiction Award.