Callum Linden's video: Paul Abraham: The Unicycle Guy

The Unicycle Guy- A Documentary Film In my documentary film, I decided to make my film about Paul Abraham and his story of being "The Unicycle Guy". The Unicycle Guy explores the implications of change and thus, making the best out of troubling situations. Told through the eyes of Paul Abraham, we see his personal change from Paul to The Unicycle Guy, as he sets out on a journey to help fight cancer. In making my documentary, I placed an ad on craigslist looking for somebody with an interesting story to tell. Over the course of a few weeks, I had received nearly 20 emails of people willing to make a documentary; of those people, where artists, victims of bad divorces, depression and bipolar disorder, actors and even belly dancers. However, one person stuck out to me, Paul Abraham, The Unicycle Guy. Paul told me about his journey across Toronto, and his mission to help fight cancer on a unicycle. He told me how he planned to raise money by riding from Montreal to Toronto, a nearly 600km ride, on a unicycle, all in support of cancer research. I was truly intrigued by his story, and wanted to explore to the depths, what he was doing, and why he was doing it. Spending a full day with Paul, making my documentary, I had a lot of time to really find out why he set out on his journey. I had discovered he had first bought a unicycle after his bike was stolen whilst he was at work, and that he didn't want to buy another bike, in fear that it too would be stolen. After visiting Sick Kids hospital and seeing the hundreds of kids diagnosed with cancer, Paul challenged himself to help the children, through his love of unicycling. This idea of challenging one's self to make the best out of what has been handed to us, in the hopes to make things better for others really made me want to make my documentary around him. As the day progressed, I really saw this truly selfless aspect of Paul; not only through learning about his journey, but as he offered me great advice and helped me with my documentary as much as he could. This aspect of him, I don't think was particularly well shown through my documentary, but was most definitely there and, if I could redo it, I would definitely focus more on. Technically, I decided to show Paul downtown on his unicycle where he could be seen most. As Paul told me, he rides everywhere on his unicycle, and I decided to show that in my documentary. Also, the use of time lapses was meant to symbolize change. To me, they represent the passing of time, and change which, thematically, relates to Paul as he changes from Paul to the Unicycle Guy. Paul really helped me to think more selflessly and really motivated me to make this documentary the best I could. Not only because I should be putting my best effort into everything, but because I really wanted to portray Paul well. His whole story and philosophy on life is rarely seen these days, and I think through making this documentary, I hopefully brought his philosophy into the light. ---------------------- To help Paul in his journey to fight cancer, please visit: http://www.sickkidsfoundation.com/page/paulabraham , https://www.youtube.com/user/Bramzpeakz , and https://twitter.com/UnicycleTourCAN --------------------- A film by Callum Linden