DAY 45
“Of course the first thing that happens when I got here was a flat tire. Nail. I had some slime in my bag so got a guy at a motorbike shop to put it in.”
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DAY 52
the brakes on his chair locked. “I just went flying out of the chair head first. I woke up in a pool of blood with all these people around me,” Shelley says. At first, Duprel and Pandza thought that someone had attacked him. All they could see from a distance was the yellow neoprene sleeve that Shelley kept over the back of his chair. When he saw that flash of color, it was a sure sign Shelley wasn’t in the chair; Duprel’s stomach tightened into knots. They doubled-back, found Shelley and took him to a hospital. He was treated and released, but the fall rattled him. He grew despondent and stayed in bed for days. In the film, Pandza and Duprel call Shelley’s mom to tell her about the accident. “Can I talk to him? Is he okay, is he conscious?” she asks. “He’s conscious,” Duprel tells
her. “He’s awake, he’s just not getting out of bed. He’s not doing anything.” “He can’t go on,” his mom tells them. “He’s just in way over his head. Way over his head and you know, I was afraid this was going to happen.” Shelley, though, had already made up his mind. This was something he had to do. In his bed, lit by a small lamp and in between the mechanical sounds of the respirator he uses for help to breath while he sleeps, he told the camera: “I have to prove that people in wheel chairs can do this. That they can do anything.” Still, the fall was a bit of a wakeup call. “He has a seatbelt,” Pandza says. “But he was not wearing it. He wore it after that.” “For about a week,” Shelley says, with a smile.
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helley’s been back in the United States now for about two years, and life has changed. He’s given up his career in electrical engineering entirely and now wants to be a motivational speaker. His last-minute stop in the United Arab Emirates at the end of the trip was so he could talk to students at the American School of Dubai, where he went to high school. He told them that if he could travel the world in a wheelchair, that they could do anything. He told them that there is no adversity they couldn’t overcome, and no dream they couldn’t follow. It’s a message he hopes Duprel and Pandza’s documentary of his trip, “Beyond the Chair,” can carry for him when the time comes that he can’t. So far it hasn’t been an entirely smooth road. After returning home, the pair worked furiously to complete a rough cut of the film to meet a submission deadline for the 2010 Sundance Film Festival. They’d mentioned it in passing to Shelley, who was more excited by the prospect than they’d expect-
ed. Later, Duprel realized why. There is no cure for muscular degenerative disease, and Shelley wanted nothing more than to be able to present his film to an audience while he still had some ability, however meager, to walk on his own legs. But time wasn’t on their side. The massive amount of footage that made for such a telling and honest story made editing an almost impossible task. The deadline for Sundance passed without a finished product, and Duprel watched tears form in Shelley’s eyes when he told him the film was too incomplete to be accepted. But the story, of course, isn’t over quite yet. After reading an open letter that Duprel posted on the documentary’s website about Sundance, the International Documentary Association put them in touch with Tina Imahara, an Academy Award-nominated editor who’s managed to rework films to the point that they were not only accepted into Sundance after first being rejected, but have gone on to win awards. She’s agreed to finish the final cut of “Beyond the Chair.” Now they’re looking toward distribution in theaters as early as August. The prospect brings a smile to Shelley’s face. “I’ve learned a lot,” he says. “And I want to share my experiences with others.” He went across the world to find what he thought he was missing from his life, and to escape what he didn’t like. He went looking for friends, for like-minded individuals, for love, for adventure. By all accounts, he got it all. “How many times did you fall in love on the trip, Drew?” Duprel asks Shelley. “I’d say at least twice.” “At least,” Shelley answers. For more information on “Beyond the Chair,” or to pre-order a DVD copy of the film, visit btcmovie.com. SUMMER 2010
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