Murderball: inside one of the year's most talked-about documentaries

The winner of the documentary Audience Award at this year's Sundance Film Festival, Murderball delves into the world of wheelchair rugby, a full-contact sport played in tricked-out chairs by quadriplegics of varying degrees of physical mobility. The film centers around Team U.S.A and one of its star players, Mark Zupan, a tattooed former high-school athlete who lost the use of his legs when he was thrown from the back of a pickup truck driven by his best friend, Christopher Igoe, who was drunk at the time. But more than a sports documentary or a movie about people with disabilities, Murderball is an exploration of the lives of the players and their experiences. Here, Winona Ryder talks to Zupan, along with Murderbalrs co-directors, Dana Adam Shapiro and Henry Alex Rubin, about the film, which hits theaters this month.

WINONA RYDER: So, Zupan, I know you love shoes, so my first question is, What kind of shoes are you wearing right now?

MARK ZUPAN: I'm wearing a pair of Fluevogs.

WR: They're Doc Marten-type shoes, right?

MZ: They're very similar.

HENRY ALEX RUBIN: Tell her about how you never wear out your shoes.

MZ: Well, I don't--I mean, how the hell would I? I'll keep a pair of shoes for 10-12 years. It's not like I'm going to wear out the bottoms.

WR: But you want to scuff them up a bit.

MZ: Yeah, so they don't look so new.

DANA ADAM SHAPIRO: You really don't get

that worn-in shoe look, do you, Zupan?

MZ: The ones I'm wearing are pretty worn in. It's not like I don't scuff them up at all, boys and girl.

HAR: Zupan, are you at work?

MZ: No, I'm getting a tattoo. They're just finishing up on my arm.

WR: What is it a tattoo of?

MZ: We just designed something. There's going to be a lot of black.

WR: Are you at a tattoo parlor, or did they come to you?

MZ: I'm at a parlor right now.

HAR: Do they have on-call tattoo artists?

MZ: If you have enough money, I'm sure they have whatever you want.

WR: [laughs] So, I wanted to ask you, Zupan, how your parents reacted to Murderball when they saw it for the first time? I imagine it would be very emotional for them but also really uplifting.

MZ: Well, when my dad first saw it, he was like, "Holy shit!"--I mean, he couldn't put what he was feeling into words because the movie made him cry. My dad warned my mom that there were some things that might upset her, but when she saw it, she just kind of shook her head and said, "Yup, that's my son." A lot of the stuff that's in the movie is stuff that I've never really dealt with. Seeing Igoe again was especially difficult, as was the first time I went back to the place I got hurt.

WR: What do you remember from those hours after the accident?

MZ: Not much, to tell you the truth. I remember hitting the water and looking around, going, "Oh, shit. This is a new one." I remember trying to keep the red ants from pinching my fingers and toes. I ended up hanging off a branch to hold my head above water because I was afraid of drowning.

WR: How long were you stuck in the canal?

MZ: Thirteen and a half hours. My initial thought was, Let's just get up and find our way home. But when I tried to get up, my legs wouldn't move, and I just pretty much lost it. I started crying. Then I got my shit together and said, "Fuck it, I guess it's time to hang on." I don't remember anything after that besides waking up when it was light out and getting hit in the face with raindrops.

WR: Did somebody find you, or did you get out yourself?

MZ: Somebody found me. There was a guy in an office building across from the canal, and he decided to go eat his lunch outside in his car. I was getting hot, so he opened his window a lit tie, and he heard a noise. At first he thought was from the off-ramp, but he kept hearing the same thing, so he decided to get out of the car and check to see what it was. He saw the crow of my head across the canal, so he called 9-1-1. The fire chief told my father that the only things above water were my eyes, my nose, my mouth and an arm. Once they got me over to land, told them that I couldn't move or feel my legs so they took me to a trauma hospital, and the rest is his-tor-y.

WR: What about the man who heard you and called 9-1-1? Has he seen Murderball?

MZ: I don't know, but he actually contacted me He found my name somehow, and we were supposed to meet for lunch, but we never did The guy's name is Martin Story. If he hears something about the movie, I'm sure he'll see it It was kind of wild.

WR: Who introduced you to wheelchair rugby?

MZ: This therapist, John True in Miami. I didn't know what the hell was going on, but after a while I was like, "This is cool." I have an athletic background, so I can pick up sports fairly easily--you know, the rules, the ideas, the ways of doing things. But the first time I played in a chair I was like, "Wow! This is something that I never thought was going to be possible again."

WR: I wanted to ask you, Dana and Henry about the decision to include that footage of George W. Bush meeting Zupan and some of the other players at the White House. I under. stand that it was designed to show people how far murderball has come as a sport, but not long after, there's another scene of the players showing these really young-looking kids who have come back from Iraq with missing limbs what you can do in a wheelchair. Whatever your opinion is of the president or the war in Iraq, I think it's really important for people to see that there are these young kids who are coming back maimed. These kids went over to Iraq and fought, but there are a lot of questions right now about how well they're being taken care of when they come back.