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Indian director Reema Kagti admits that living in Mumbai and working in the Mumbai film industry for so long tends to make people a "little jaded," not to mention a "little full of yourself."

Which is why she claims it was a "really humbling experience" making "Superboys of Malegaon," her biopic about a group of small-town, DIY Indian filmmakers led by amateur director Nasir Sheikh.

"The first thing about Nasir that really hit me was as a director. He had no agenda. He was just making films for the love of making films, and to me, that was very humbling," she said, speaking at the Variety Lounge at the Red Sea Film Festival in Saudi Arabia. "And I think at some point I kind of just took that on and followed my instinct and did whatever I did just for the love of making this film."

"Superboys of Malegaon," which had its world premiere in Toronto, is loosely based on Faiza Ahmad Khan's 2008 documentary "Supermen of Malegaon," following Sheikh and his friends as they attempted to make a parody production of "Superman: The Movie." But as Kagti notes, her film broadens the story to examine "the making of Nasir."

On hand to help was Sheikh himself, who Kagti and screenwriter Varun Grover spent a lengthy time within the city of Malagaon while developing the film. "He's a great archivist of his own life. We got tons of material, and Varun started a script from that," she said.

Adarsh Gourav, who plays Sheikh in "Superboys," said he was also moved by the story behind the film, something that immediately attracted him to the project.

"It's such an inspiring and beautiful story of these bunch of people who just decide to take this plunge into making a film and without having the resources, without having the technical expertise or the know-how and just kind of taking that leap of faith, because they believed in their dream and they believed in themselves when nobody else around them did," he said. "It's really, really inspiring stuff."

As for Sheikh, while he obviously provided the source material for "Superboys of Malegaon" and also helped with the writing and was on set, Kagti gave him a cameo role.

"He's in the opening credit of the film," she says. "He's playing the projectionist in the cinema."