Paul Nadler has a bad attitude about bad attitudes.

Ten years ago, Montrealer Paul Nadler was a creative maverick - snowboarding, rock-climbing and scuba diving, taking part in all-night play-writing sessions, attracting women, and winning awards as a hip television director.  Then he was found alone on a road in Egypt, without clothes and I.D., comatose in the hot sun after a car accident.  He had been left for dead.  The doctors said he would never recover from TBI (Traumatic Brain Injury).  He was only 30.

Braindamadj'd…Take II documents Nadler's gutsy, manic determination to regain his previous life. An intensely personal account, Braindamadj'd…Take II traces the excruciating process of recovery, both physical and psychological.  It features Nadler's often sardonic comments on his progress, ("I'm as graceful as a dancing elephant on speed in a glass shop"), and the observations of key people involved in his recovery.  Among them are his doggedly supportive mother, Vera Nadler- Hébert, whose single-mindedness helped pull him through the coma; his ironic but firm-willed father Arie; his sister, cousins, friends, colleagues and medical professionals - one of whom asserts that working with Paul has changed the way she treats patients.

Braindamadj'd…Take II is about conquering fears, setting goals, and achieving what others think impossible.  The film's ending contains a startling surprise.

The film reflects the edgy manipulation of images that had earned Paul Nadler his reputation.  He would create eye-catching graphics and textures, and blend them with very controlled "live-action" footage.  He developed the technique as part of the founding creative team of Quebec's MusiquePlus and co-creator of its hit show Zone X.  He also employed it in his cool redesign of CBC-TV's hit teenage series Street Cents, which he was working on just prior to the accident.

Braindamadj'd: Take II has been acclaimed around the world, winning prizes in Canada, USA, Australia, Belgium and Japan. Most recently, the film was nominated for four Gemini Awards, more than any other documentary this year, and won two (Best Director, Best Biography).  Shortly afterwards, it won the Grand Prix Japan Prize at a ceremony in Tokyo attended by the Crown Prince of Japan.

Braindamadj'd…Take II is produced by Jonathan Finkelstein of Apartment 11 Productions in association with CBC Newsworld.

Read more about the film at the filmmaker's website, Apartment 11 Productions.