Pedro Almodóvar's PAIN AND GLORY is, yes, painful and glorious (and funny and moving, and subtle and smart)

Anyone who has followed the more-than-40-year career of Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar can hardly help but have noticed the tonal change in his films from the crazy, highly sexual and often darkly comedic to the more serious -- if still sometimes dark and sexual -- explorations into family and Freud (granted, his very own version of the good doctor).

Almodóvar's later films may have been successful to varying degrees, just as were his earlier movies -- though to listen to some critics/fans, those early comedies were all fabulous and wonderful; instead, they too were a mixed bag -- yet one of the distinct pleasures of contemplating this man's fecund career (he is shown at right) comes in seeing, little by little, the enormous depth and growth involved.

TrustMovies is certainly not alone in finding his latest film, PAIN AND GLORY, the pinnacle and culmina-tion (but not the finale, I hope) of his career.

In it, Antonio Banderas (above and below) -- who has appeared in numerous Almodóvar films over the years and whose career took off via this filmmaker -- plays an aging filmmaker very much like Almodóvar, whose life story we see unfurl here via flashback and present-day excursions into his current life of enormous physical pain (everything from excruciating back pain to migraines),

drug addiction, the rekindling of both a friendship and a hugely important love relationship, and a possible career rehabilitation via the rediscovery of one of his successful older films.

If this sounds like a lot to cover in a mere two hours, let it be known that the filmmaker does it all with breathtaking skill, surprising subtlety and intelligence, the expected (but still gorgeous) visuals exquisitely combining composition and color, and drawing spot-on performances from a well-chosen cast that includes Penélope Cruz (above, playing his mother in her younger days) and Julieta Serrano (below, right, as older mom).

The two performance highlights, however, come from that fine Argentine actor Leonardo Sbaraglia (below, right), playing the ex-lover with such passion, wit and alertness that this pretty much constitutes a career-best role -- in a career that already has some really spectacular ones (Wild Horses, Intacto, Contestant and King of the Mountain),

and from Asier Etxeandia (below), as the ex-friend and actor who starred in the filmmaker's most famous work, now estranged but gleefully ready to reconnect via drugs and maybe a new acting role. Etxeandia is exciting to watch in action, and his role is one of the film's best written and realized, as well as its most complicated creation.

Almodóvar does not attempt to make his "hero'" all that heroic. He's a user -- not just of drugs but of people. Watch sadly at how he treats his devoted personal secretary (Nora Navas, below, right). But, oh, god, he is so human. And his creativity, from what we can gather, is worth saving and encouraging.

As the filmmaker's delightfully intelligent younger self, Asier Flores (shown at bottom) proves a real find. This youngster gets one of the film's perfect scenes, in which incipient sexuality overtakes our hero in one marvelous, sudden rush. No explanation necessary, and Almodóvar doesn't belabor the point. (Shown below is the amazingly sensuous César Vicente, who plays the key element in that pivotal scene.)

Another bit of perfection occurs at film's end, when the writer/director simply moves his camera just a tad, in the process quietly letting us know that, "Hey, it's only a movie, right?" Sure. But what a movie!

From Sony Pictures Classics (and I would guess a front-runner for Best Foreign Language Film nomination), in Spanish with English subtitles, and lasting 113 minutes, Pain and Glory, after opening in key cities, hits South Florida this Friday, October 18, all over the Miami, Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach areas. To find the theater(s) nearest you, simply click here, then click on GET TICKETS, scroll down to the October 18 dates and find your local theater(s). Or just fill in your zip code in the blank space and make things even easier.

Stephen Dunn's CLOSET MONSTER: Growing up gay, closeted, and a little crazy in Canada

Gay coming-of-age stories may be rife but it seems there's always room for one more -- if that one is handled with enough creativity and energy to hold our attention. CLOSET MONSTER is just such a film, and if it does occasionally deal in cliché, much of it proves visually interesting and well-acted so that it circumvents mild objections. As written and directed by Canadian filmmaker Stephen Dunn (shown below), the movie should resonate with any viewer who can identify with a child, Oscar, who feels abandoned by one parent and terribly misunderstood by the remaining one, and who, from a young age, tries to come to terms with feeling "different," while seeing in the worst possible way the results of what being different can bring.

Our hero -- played as a child by Jack Fulton and as an young man by Connor Jessup (below) -- has a somewhat less-than-normal grasp on reality, and this takes his character far enough out of cliché to render him not simply unusual but maybe a bit of a problem. Not only does he carry on conversations with his pet hamster, Buffy, she answers him, as well. This might seem unduly fantastical, but since Buffy is voiced by Isabella Rossellini, and what she has to say is often worth hearing, we can put up with this little oddity. (There were times, though, when I wished Buffy's accent was just a bit more understandable.)

It is visually -- with camerawork by Bobby Shore and editing from Bryan Atkinson (of last year's terrifically funny Guidance) -- that the movie makes its finest impression. How Mr. Dunn and his cast and crew weave together past and present, the horrible event that lays waste to our hero's psyche, and how he unfortunately works this into his sexual life and fantasies are handled quite effectively, creating a major hurdle to be leaped before Oscar can really grow up.

Helping or hindering him along the way are his kindly friend, Emma (Sofia Banzhaf, above, left), and his obtuse and mostly nasty father (Aaron Abrams, below, left),

Most helpful of all is his male friend and co-worker, played, by Aliocha Schneider, below, with just the right mixture of easy-going confidence and bi-sex appeal). Oscar's mom (a very good Joanne Kelly), though missing in action for some time, finally proves a decent friend and parent, as well.

But it's Oscar himself, along with the finely-tuned performance of Mr. Jessup, that holds the film together. This kid is creative and a little crazy, and we root for him to work it all out. The film's ending is a kind of beginning: at once sad, funny, moving and as odd as all that has come before. Closet Monster is worth seeing, and maybe more than once.

From Strand Releasing and running just 90 minutes, the movie opens this coming Friday, September 23, in New York City at the IFC Center, and the following Friday, September 30, in Los Angeles at the Laemmle Playhouse 7 and the Sundance Sunset Cinema. To all currently scheduled playdates, cities and theaters, click here, then click on Screenings in the task bar midway down the page.

Samuel Beckett in and on FILM, as Ross Lipman's grand compilation, NOT FILM opens

When I tell you that today, we're covering a two-hour-and-nine-minute documentary about the making of a 22-minute movie, eyes will probably roll. But when the filmmaker is a fellow named Ross Lipman -- noted for his terrific restorations of works by Chaplin, Welles, Altman, Cassavetes, Shirley Clarke and Kenneth Anger -- and who turns out to himself have a tremendous talent for documentary filmmaking, you had best put his movie NOTFILM on your must-see list. That is, if you have any reverence for Buster Keaton, Samuel Beckett, cinema history and the artistic and filmmaking processes.

Lipman's movie (the filmmaker is shown at right) is all about how another, earlier movie got made: a film called simply FILM, written by that uber-famous-and-reclusive writer Mr. Beckett; directed by a noted theater director but newcomer to movies, Alan Schneider; and starring the beloved silent-film star, Keaton, who died the year after Film was completed.

TrustMovies imagined that he had somehow seen Film when it first appeared. Well, he hadn't. But he is happy to have seen it now. Though not considered much of a success upon its release, the little film holds up much better than critical assessment would have it. All about "the we and the I" (eye) -- with a nod to Michel Gondry -- Film is also about seeing and being seen, and, as always with Mr. Beckett, about the state of being itself.

Film is actually fun. That's a prime moment, above, in which the only sound in this "silent" movie is heard. There is also a marvelous scene of animals doing a kind of slapstick routine, and of course there's Keaton. And though, back in the day, critics and audiences were evidently flummoxed as to what the thing meant, now, with another half century of movies and film knowledge under our belt, audiences should have no trouble deciphering "meaning," should they need it that desperately. (It seemed pretty obvious to me.)

Also, Film lasts but 22 minutes. Even if you don't appreciate it (I think you will), you'll have spent almost no time at all. (We just watched Tarantino's The Hateful Eight last night and gave up nearly three hours to that well-acted, dreadfully written, poorly conceived, sub-level, Agatha-Christie-writes-a-western piece of trash. Talk about wasted time that one can never recover.)

Now, what about NotFilm? Can you really spend over two hours delineating/discovering what went into the making of Film? You have no idea. What Mr. Lipman has given us compiles history, personality, filmmaking and marketing, along with all the "art" and "chance" involved in the moviemaking process. And he does all this with such intelligence and grace that I probably could have watched a full four hours without tiring or even complaining.

Lipman begins with an interesting cliché that he then turns upside down: "Art shouldn't be about art, it should be about life -- as though they were indistinguishable." From there we meet Mr. Beckett and learn of his relationship with Barney Rosset and what he wanted to do with his Film and how he planned to achieve it. While this will be catnip for Beckett fans, even those, like me, who don't find his work as meaningful or brilliant as do some, it will still fascinate,

Using a number of talking-head interviews, done with smart and on-point Q&As with people like Kevin Brownlow; Jean Schneider (the widow of Alan); premiere Beckett interpreter, the now late Billie Whitelaw; and many others, including James Karen an actor friend of Keaton who plays a supporting role in Film, Lipman allows us to learn so very much about how art is created and how life intrudes on that art. (Mr. Beckett's cataracts -- that's the writer, shown above and below -- have much to do with how the Keaton character perceives the world in front of him).

We also witness, thanks to reams of archival footage the filmmaker viewed and then parsed, a number of small surprises (how Rosset managed to tape-record Beckett, who was adamant about never allowing himself to be recorded), as well as how Brownlow used his (then) excellent memory to write an immediate transcript of his talk with Beckett.

Lipman spent seven years making his movie, and it shows -- in everything from how people age and change to the amount of material collected and then sifted through to find the gems. We learn that an entire scene that would have brought Film to a half-hour length had to be cut; how Beckett even had camera angles mapped out; and how film critic Leonard Maltin, who was but a youngster at the time, managed to be there on location near the Brooklyn Bridge (above) as filming took place.

Finally Lipman addresses the change from photo-chemical film to digital, and alerts us that the latter is how his film is being shown. Yes, NotFilm really is not film. As written, narrated, photographed and edited by Lipman, this wonderful work is an appreciation of everything from the creative process to Beckett, Schneider and cinematography (we also meet and hear from the late Haskell Wexler who, only by chance, was unable to shoot Film).

This milestone work is being fittingly released via Milestone Films and will open in New York City this Friday, April 1, for a one-week run at Anthology Film Archives and in Los Angeles at the American Cinematheque from April 1 - 9. At both theaters you'll have the chance to see Film along with NotFilm. (Check the schedule for each theater.) Further screenings across the country can be found by clicking here. Whether or not Film will be shown along with NotFilm at other venues is unclear as of now. If I were you, I'd call the theater you're near and make certain -- beg if you must -- that management plans to schedule both for viewing.

Alanté Kavaïté's THE SUMMER OF SANGAILE: Lithuania's entry into this year's Oscar sweeps

TrustMovies can't quite imagine what some of the older members of the Academy will make of the hot lesbian love scenes in THE SUM-MER OF SANGAILE, the official Lithuanian entry into the upcoming Best Foreign Language Film contention. Whatever reaction those scenes produce, I can't help but think that members will be greatly impressed with the cinematic beauty and quiet, tender artfulness of this unusual movie. Its plot may be a mere wisp, involving the coming-of-age of its fragile heroine, yet the film's visuals -- beginning to end -- prove stunning.

That the film, written and directed by Alanté Kavaïté (shown at right), won the Sundance Film festival award for directing (world cinema -- dramatic) should give some indication of how surprising those visuals are. Beginning with our heroine, Sangaile (the lovely Julija Steponaityte, below), entranced by the amazing-if-frightening work of a local stunt pilot during his air show, the film almost immediately cuts to our other protagonist, Auste (Aiste Dirziute), also a looker but one whose true beauty emerges more slowly as the film progresses.

Auste (below), hugely attracted to Sangaile, sets about meeting and seducing the slightly younger girl, and she make no bones about any of this. A bright, creative young woman, gifted in fashion and photography (both the clothes and the photographs seen here are good enough to turn the heads of titans in both industries), Auste uses these skills to draw Sangaile -- who early on in the film has a clearly unsatisfying sexual encounter with a young man from Auste's group -- close, closer, then whew!

All the while, Ms Kavaïté's concern for the environment in which these girls exist -- the incredibly verdant countryside, the spacious sky, the local lake, the very different homes in which the two girls live -- into which come the almost profound art that Auste produces with the visual help of Sangaile combine to create a memorable fragment of a movie. (The outstanding cinematography is by Dominique Colin.)

Sangaile has health problems -- diabetes, perhaps, and vertigo that keeps her from pursuing her dream of flying -- and she also has a somewhat distant mother, a former ballerina who appears to have had some trouble honing her parenting skills.

For her part, Auste seems surprisingly competent as both an artist and autonomous person. She "manages" the relationship as best she can, while helping Sangaile toward her own autonomy. The movie, however, is finally more a visual feast than any deep exploration of character or relationship.

But as that, The Summer of Sangaile is well worth seeing as it gently yet luxuriously probes the place of family, friendship, sexuality, creativity and challenge in the lives of the young.

From Strand Releasing, in Lithuanian with English subtitles and running 97 minutes, this Lithuania/France/Netherlands co-production opens in New York City at the IFC Center this Friday, November 20, and in Los Angeles at the Sundance Sunset Cinema on December 4.

All about artist Nick Cave in Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard's film -- 20,000 DAYS ON EARTH

There are, I believe, an enormous number of "staged" scenes (waking up in the morning, a psychotherapy session, visits with friends) in 20,000 DAYS ON EARTH, the new film -- I am not certain you could call this anything like a full-out documentary, and yet it does manage to let us see and understand its main subject, the singer/songwriter/screenwriter/artist Nick Cave, about as thoroughly as any 97-minute movie could -- by Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard (shown below, left and right).

What Forsyth and Pollard have accomplished, however, is something grand and encompassing. Via their idea of bringing together Cave's history, his career, his "notebooks," his music, even some of his performing, the twosome, together with their subject, have created a film in which ideas bounce off each other and grow into something approaching an entire and very rich view of a special personality and talent.

Mr. Cave, above (engrossed) and below (performing), is indeed an original and someone who is multi-talented. He is also, it seems, a man who wants to understand where that talent comes from and how it connects to what he values most in life. To that end he pursues this via friends (that's his long-time collaborator Warren Ellis, at left, three photos below), family, shrink, and of course his work. The filmmakers tag along, having made their own suggestions, and then shoot and edit, wrapping their whole study into a fascinating, unconventional semi-documentary/biopic.

From his Australian roots to Brighton, that rainy, weather-beaten British beach town; from memories of his dad and his first experience with a girl to the various musical groups he's played with; in archival material (below), present-day shots, memories, diaries, and his music and the performing of it, Cave appears as a surprisingly full-bodied character. (At times he reminded me in his own way of the performance artist Marina Abramovic: Maybe it's their dark clothing and severity of appearance, coupled to their intelligence and non-mainstream art...?)

What comes through most strongly here is Cave's sheer intelligence -- along with his ability to feel strongly and put these feelings/ideas together.  And yet, is 20,000 Days on Earth simply a new kind of hagiography? Clearly the filmmakers love their subject and he them (considering the enormous access Cave gave them into his life and art), and the result is a kind of magical film in which we watch, learn and enjoy the experience quite fully.

And everything we see and hear is positive; there's hardly a negative moment in the whole shebang. Perhaps Mr. Cave is a remarkably thoughtful, even-handed and even-tempered fellow. If not, well, we've missed that part of the equation. What we get, however, is so well-conceived, -executed, -filmed and -edited (this is one gorgeous movie) that it's a constant pleasure to view, hear and think about in retrospect. So, yes, it's difficult to complain about something this involving and enjoyable.

20,000 Days on Earth is something new in the documentary/biopic field. You won't easily be able to compare it to any other film. If you know Cave's work (I'm a big fan of his raspy, craggy voice and his songs, less so of his screenwriting), you'll want to see it. But even if you're a newcomer to Nick, I suspect the movie will grab and hold you. (That's Kylie Minogue in the back seat, above.)

In their unique blending of history, personality, music, cinematography, ideas, performance and more, Forsyth and Pollard have come up with something original and accomplished. Their movie -- from Drafhouse Films -- opens this Wednesday here in New York City at Film Forum. In the weeks to follow, it will open in cities all across the country. To see where and when, simply click here and scroll down.

DOC NYC 2013, arriving November 14, boasts an amazing line-up, with MISFIRE--about the life and death of The Shooting Gallery--a don't miss!

Each year it gets bigger and better. That's DOC NYC 2013, the annual array of documentaries short and full-length, that -- in its way -- hands you the world in eight days. This year's line-up, which you can access by clicking here, is a full-out amazement. I spent an hour just clicking on each individual event/film, then hoping that they call get a chance to be seen, either in theaters eventually or via cable/TV. For folk who love the documentary form -- though that form continues to evolve immensely from year to year -- this is probably the highlight of the movie-going year.

Because TrustMovies has been away of late, and in any case is trying to shift his blog over to covering mainly what's good (or not) on Netflix streaming, he had to miss many of the press screenings for these films. One movie he did manage to see -- and revel in -- is the documentary titled MISFIRE: The Rise and Fall of The Shooting Gallery from director Whitney Ransick, shown below, a fellow who was actually a part of The Shooting Gallery when that much-loved, much-lauded and early New York-based "independent film studio" came into being-- mostly by chance and due to the work of a group filmmakers who had met while studying at the State University of New York, Purchase -- back in the early 1990s.

The Shooting Gallery (TSG, as it would eventually be known) lasted only one decade but seemed to almost single-handedly set the standard and tone for independent film, particularly that subsection set here on the east coast. What Ransick's movie does, and extraordinarily well, is show us how TSG came into being, what it accomplished -- often, it seemed by chance and sheer luck -- and how the differing goals of the men in charge (making movies or making money) probably doomed TSG from the outset.

Ransick uses a plethora of talking heads here, but fortunately they all talk well, smartly and honestly, about what TSG meant to them, what happened from their perspective, and why. We hear from everyone from actors like Robin Tunney (we also see the early Edie Falco, below, left, with Adam Trese) to directors (one of the founders, Bob Gosse), the casting director, the guy in charge of music, accountants, marketing mavens and so many more.

Their words and memories help create the picture of young movie-makers hoping to create art but settling for the best they could do on generally minuscule budgets. Given all the talent involved, the firm had but a single hit movie (but what a hit!): Sling Blade. (TSG also released You Can Count on Me, but I'm not sure how overall profitable that one actually was.) Film buffs will have heard of other of TSG's output --- Laws of Gravity and Niagara Niagara for two -- but even someone like TrustMovies, who closely followed independent film, managed to miss other TSG movies such as Hand Gun (below) and New Jersey Drive.

Along about the time of TSG's big hit, the group gets some excellent advice from Chris Blackwell of Island Records & Films: "Stay true to yourself and stay true to each other because, collectively, you'll be much stronger than you can be as individuals." Smart words, but hard to do when, from the outset, founder Gosse and co-founder Larry Meistrich had diametrically opposed views of what was important. (Meistrich and his friend Steve Carlis, TSG's CFO refused to be interviewed for the film, and while it is difficult not to see them as the villains here, Ransick and the others don't demonize the pair. They're viewed more in sorrow than in anger.)

The movie offers a lot of humor, too. One of the funniest segments recounts the filming of a short called My Birthday Cake (above), the day after the lead actor had been dumped by his longtime girlfriend.

What finally brought TSG down? Remember the dawn of the Internet bubble and all those come-to-nothing IPOs? Sure enough, Meistrich and Carlis went whole hog down that road. When bankruptcy arrived, the little company owed something like 72 million dollars. Talk about cautionary tales! And yet Misfire seems anything but a downer. Instead it's full of life and expectations, the thrill of creativity and exploration. It'll make you proud of and excited for these young filmmakers (shown above), now firmly into middle age or beyond (shown below), even as it leaves you with some pain and sadness for what might have been.

One of the crew is now in Brooklyn, making pies (which are said to be quite tasty). "It was great," he tells us of the TSG days, "but it wasn't as real as what I'm doing now." The movie, running 78 information-, surprise- and emotion-packed minutes, plays at DOC NYC one week from today, Sunday, November 17, at 7pm at the IFC Center. Click here for tickets.

I would wager that Misfire is sure to gain a theatrical release, as it's a must-see, not only for those in the industry but for anyone even remotely interested in independent film-making and its history -- from both the creative and business perspectives.