BATKID BEGINS directed by Dana Nachman. A Warner Bros. release. 87 minutes. Opens Friday (July 10). Rating: NNNN
Watch online: iTunes
On November 15, 2013, five-year-old leukemia survivor Miles Scott ran around San Francisco pretending to be a superhero. Orchestrated by the Make-A-Wish Foundation, his adventure ricocheted around the world on social media. Rough estimates suggest that as many as 1.7 billion people might have been aware of it.
Dana Nachman’s Batkid Begins is a process documentary about what it takes to pull off an experience of this magnitude, starting with the child who made an impossible request – during his years of chemo, Miles said he wanted to be Batman – and then shifting its focus to the grown-ups trying to construct an adventure worthy of the wish.
The real heroes of the day, it turns out, were the foundation’s Patricia Wilson and acrobat Eric Johnston, who enlisted dozens of colleagues and friends in the scheme. And Nachman shows us how their kindness proved contagious, rippling outward in unexpected ways to touch people all over the world. Bring kleenex.
Don’t miss our interview with director Dana Nachman here.
