Val (2021)

IMDb plot summary: Documentary centering on the daily life of actor Val Kilmer featuring never-before-seen footage spanning 40 years.

Directed by Ting Poo and Lee Scott.

This is now the second documentary I've seen released in 2021 with the premise of "This celebrity will look back through their home videos with us!", after Kid 90. Val is a more compelling one, perhaps partly because he had a wider breadth of career to examine, but mostly because it does actually put forth a narrative of sorts, centered around Kilmer's continual search for his one great part, and then just when he'd found it, he lost it all too quickly to throat cancer, which took his voice from him almost completely. (Most of the film is narrated by Kilmer's son Jack, whose voice does bear a striking resemblance to his father's.) I do wish the film had dedicated a bit more time to the rumors of him being difficult to work with -- they touched on it JUST enough to make a point of it and then rushed past it, which felt even more awkward than if they'd ignored it completely. This is a little long for someone only a moderate fan of Kilmer's work, but it's a decent watch.

How it entered my Flickchart:

Val < Dark and Stormy Night

Val > The Lorax (1972)

Val > No Sudden Move

Val < The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer

Val < The Shop Around the Corner

Val > Jurassic World

Val > Wild Zero

Val > Streets of Fire

Val < The Fourth Kind

Val < Pacific Rim

Val > The Illusionist

Val < Office Space

Final spot: #2050 out of 3435, or 40%.