The Man Who Can

Eleven-year-old Malik is a special boy with Down syndrome. At the beginning of The Man Who Can, he's jumping around and dancing with his cousins and sister. In voice-over, he introduces everyone, including himself, and then he proceeds to tell us, "Daddy can't come to Holland anymore. We're going to Senegal." We never get any more details than this, and the film becomes contemplative from this point on. It's clear that Malik will have to find his way in Senegal. Everything is new and different, there's no one to play with, and everything he learned back in Holland seems different here. Losing power in Senegal can't be resolved by screwing in a new fuse, as the clever boy suggests. One night, when his father tells him a story about an African king, Malik rediscovers his self-confidence: in the end, he is the man who can do anything. In 2003, director Nadine Kuipers was accepted to the Netherlands Film and Television Academy with a film about Malik, his mother, and the book she made for her son to help him through life. Kuipers has continued to follow this special mother-son relationship, with Michael Apted's Up series in the back of her mind. (International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam)