Sunshine Superman

It is rare to see a documentary that feels like a full film Sunshine Superman feels like you have been to movies. It has drama, a love story and gorgeous aerial photography. I highly recommend seeing on the big screen. I saw the film in Atlanta with a crowd that gave it a standing ovation. It is a crowd pleaser yet also something deeper. The film explores themes of mortality , faith, inspiration, and what it means to be fully awake in the mad world. The soundtrack is fantastic the film is worth seeing for the soundtrack alone. Some will compare the film with Man on Wire. I think that is a bit too easy and not really true the film is deeper and and the characters richer. The poetic sensibilities are different and a bit more soft (in a good way) in Sunshine Superman.

This film made me cry and I am a man... It was a love story and also very visually exciting. I saw it in Toronto and I am going to see it again and again!! Carl Boenish was inspiring and really an amazing character study. I wish the film were a bit longer but other then that a perfect film. The old film footage was good to see. I loved the old news footage and the great style of the current day stuff. The ending scene was SICK!!!! IMDb is making me write more but really what I want to say is you should see it. My GF even liked it despite the fact she is afraid of heights. I felt like I wanted to try BASE jumping something I never would actually go and do. I think seeing is this film on the big screen is essential it is not a normal documentary.

Greetings again from the darkness. When at a dinner party someone introduces themselves as "an engineer", we don't typically settle in for a long evening of tales describing their daredevil and death-defying hobbies. Filmmaker Marah Strauch teaches us being too quick to judge could cost us the exhilarating story of Carl Boenish, the father of BASE jumping.

Mr. Boenish was an engineer turned cinematographer turned skydiver and cliff jumper. Despite his unbridled energy and enthusiasm, his engineering background (Hughes Aircraft) provided the analytical foundation that helped him plan "safe" jumps for years. And it was his love of film and cinematography that produced a treasure trove of film clips from some breathtaking jumps … beginning with his 1978 leap from Yosemite's El Capitan.

The film is about Boenish's thirst for the next big jump, but it's also about his jumping partner and wife Jean, and the bond between them. GoPro cameras have spoiled us today. We are accustomed to film clips of just about anything that involves speed, height or any person looking for a thrill. Thirty plus years ago, such clips weren't possible … except with Boenish and his clunky cameras strapped to helmets on these jumps.

BASE jumping is an acronym for Building, Antenna, Span, Earth … the types of jumps required to join the ranks of Boenish's group. We witness the fights against national park Rangers, and the clandestine operations that led to jumps from under construction skyscrapers in Los Angeles and Houston. Boenish truly pushed the Nature's Law vs. Man's Law conflict.

Director Strauch takes us through the Guiness record jump at Norway's Troll Wall, and we even hear Jean stating that Carl would have been right there with today's wing suit jumpers. The final shot of a modern day "flyer" is quite the contrast to those early Boenish jumps. The film answers "How and Why", and leaves little doubt that the genetic make-up is quite different for this group of thrill-seekers than for the rest of us … and being an engineer doesn't exclude one from either group!

It was a really good film that did a good job of capturing a moment in time and sketching out one man's contribution to Earth's history.

It's the exciting portrait of Carl Boenish, once an engineer, found the job boring in comparison to his hobby of Skydiving and while turning this, and his love of film, into a career he help to create BASE Jumping.

A lot of the footage from the movie was filmed by the subject himself, as he loves to film his jumps as much or more than he love to jump. All this personal footage made for a very personal documentary, especially as his friends and family narrated the entire film and told their own personal accounts of him.

One of the things I noticed about documentaries about subjects that are barely thirty to thirty five years old is that they have a lot of footage they can use. Boenish was enough of a celebrity in his own time, that the doc was able to use footage from TV and news coverage of the man as well as his own cinematography. And like other contemporary docs they used a lot of different forms of medium, like reenactments of things that did not happen on camera.

Which was not a lot. The filmmakers job was fairly easy as Carl love to document his life, and what a life it was, filled with nothing but joy and happiness, and inspiration to live life to the fullest to the very end.

Without doing much expect having the people still around to tell his story, tell it story, it became an up tempo doc that gets your spirits high after watching it.

If you enjoy seeing a documentary movie with awe inspiring cinematography that will educate, inspire and amaze you than you will love Sunshine Superman. I learned so much about Carl Boenish's life as an aerial cinematographer and the father of BASE jumping.

Many of Boenish's surviving colleagues as well as his wife help to tell the viewer the story of his life. He had childhood polio that he got from a vaccination. Boenish could not walk for a year due to his polio. He overcame his polio and started his career as an engineer. He eventually became a full time jumper. He said it was very important for him to be able to photograph each jump to share it with others to inspire other people.

BASE jumping, as coined by Boenish, stand for jumping off four types of starting points including buildings, antennas, spans (i.e. Bridges) and natural precipices such as cliffs. Carl Boenish said he has respect for nature's laws but not necessarily man's laws and he had legal trouble in El Capitan for jumping off the vacant Crocker building in downtown Los Angeles. In a 1984 prime time U.S. sports special hosted by David Frost, Boenish and his wife were able to break a Guinness record by jumping from Trollveggen in Western Norway.

Marah Strauch, the director of this movie spent over eight years making it. The movie reflects her passion for Carl Boenish. The footage and cinematography really make the viewer see the beauty and awe inspiring view that the jumpers have while they jumped.

My favorite part of the movie is when Carl Boenish and his wife break a Guinness record by jumping from Trollveggen in Western Norway and seeing it recorded in a prime time U.S. sports special hosted by David Frost. It is wonderful to see the excitement of both Carl and his wife when they successfully break the world record. I am impulsive and very passionate about the interests I have so I can relate to Mr. Boenish's passion for jumping and making sure he can always record it on camera.

This film teaches us to admire and appreciate the beauty and awe of nature that the jumps provide for the BASE jumpers. Carl Boenish and his fellow jumpers are basically fun-loving adventurers. In the movie, Carl says he hopes his jumping will inspire other people that they can conquer their fears seeing he and his fellow jumpers do these jumps that most of us could never dream of doing.

I give this movie 5 out of 5 stars and recommend it for ages 10 to 18. Reviewed by Adam C. KIDS FIRST! Film Critic. For more reviews by youth go to kidsfirst dot org.