ABOUT THE FILM

Wheelchair bound, without a larynx, and diagnosed with a life-threatening aortic aneurysm, Dr. Sharadkumar Dicksheet now lives only (and barely) so he can travel to India to perform free operations in marathon-like surgery sessions where up to 700 children receive treatment for their cleft lips and other deformities. Although Dicksheet survives off of social security while living in his Brooklyn apartment, his life is drastically different in India where the eight-time Nobel Prize nominee is treated like a living god. FLYING ON ONE ENGINE shows how this quirky, funny, and sometimes difficult character overcomes his own ailments by curing others.

DIRECTOR'S STATEMENT

Upon meeting Dr. Sharadkumar Dicksheet I knew almost instantly that he was a man who needed to be captured on camera.

Following him to India, I soon realized that working with Dr. Dicksheet was going to be quite the learning experience. On my first day, I anxiously filmed as 50 patients surrounded Dr. Dicksheet and begged for him to operate on them. While I knew there was something profound being captured, I could only understand what was going on through gestures.

After spending extended amounts of time with a person you begin to recognize their fallibility, which can be an equally surprising and disturbing experience. Some of the little things that endeared me to Dr. Dicksheet were the simple pleasure he found in a glass of Indian Pinot Grigio, the way he still assumes at age 78 that women continue to hit on him, and the animated bitterness he exhibits when discussing the Nobel committee's continual ignorance of his charitable work. At the same time, I would become infuriated by his almost insurmountable stubbornness and occasionally crass remarks.

But above all else, I remember the last week of filming. We were in Dr. Dicksheets apartment in Brooklyn NY and I was helping him get ready to return to India. Occasionally, I would pull out the camera as Dicksheet told a funny anecdote, and at other times, my eyes brimmed with tears as I observed a man whose health had been so crippled by countless operations and who knew very little time was left. And as I witnessed Dr. Dicksheet's courage amidst these debilitating struggles, I knew that on a certain level Flying On One Engine would have to be a film not only about one man but gracefully accepting your own mortality. (Joshua Weinstein, March 2008)

ABOUT THE CREW

Producer/Director/Cinemtographer: Joshua Z Weinstein
Joshua Z Weinstein was born in New York City. He graduated from Boston University's Communication School with a Bachelors of Film in 2005. Flying On One Engine, his feature documentary debut, premiered at the South by South West Film Festival in 2008 and went on to play some of the most important documentary film festivals in the world including being featured in the best of year at the International Documentary Festival of Amsterdam. Flying On One Engine was broadcasted on television in Germany, Sweden, Poland, Estonia, and Israel. Joshua also is the director of photography for the BBC/ITVS film Give Up Tomorrow which is scheduled for released in 2010. He is currently developing a film about cabdrivers in New York City for the BBC.

Editor: Hemal Trivedi
Hemal Trivedi has worked on PBS-Nova's "Newton's Dark Secrets," Discovery Kids' "Whiz Kids." and Jamie Redford's "Indian Lands Project." She just finished editing Miramax and BBC supported documentary "Laughter," and "Diamond Vehicle," which was featured in Indepent Film Week 2008. She is currently working on "Septentrional" an ITVS funded documentary on a Haitian band that has survived for over 60 years in the harsh and violent environment of Haiti. She has received an MFA in documentary films from "The Documentary Institute" of the University of Florida. Hemal was born and raised in Mumbai India and she is fluent in 5 different Indian languages.

Associate Producer: Nicole Lederman
Nicole Lederman works in the production department of Focus Features. Her on-set credits include "Spider-Man 3" and "Reign Over Me".

Supervising Editor: Mary Manhardt
Mary Manhardt is a documentary film editor based in New York. Her work has aired on HBO, PBS, ABC and MTV, and has been honored in film festivals worldwide, including Sundance, IDFA, Tribeca, Hot Docs and South X Southwest. Most recently, Mary edited, Nanette Burstein's American Teen, a documentary feature that premiered at Sundance '08.

Consulting Producer: Steven Ascher
Steven Ascher is an award-winning documentary filmmaker. He has been nominated for an academy award for his film "Troublesome Creek" and his projects have been screened theatrically and broadcasted nationally and internationally.