Val (2021)

Val isn’t just a celebrity documentary; it’s a self-portrait assembled from four decades of Val Kilmer filming his own life, and it feels startlingly alive—like you’re watching memory, ambition, and movie stardom flicker in real time. The directors shape that mountain of footage into something intimate and agile, moving effortlessly from the thrill of iconic roles to the quieter, more revealing moments that explain the artist behind the image. It’s candid about illness, grief, and the cost of being “difficult” in a business that rewards simplicity, but it’s also warm and often funny, with Kilmer’s creativity shining through even when his body betrays him. If you want a tidy, PR-polished career recap, this isn’t that; if you’re curious about what it feels like to live inside a performer’s restless mind, Val is hard to shake.

Val is clearly trying to be an intimate, artist-made self-portrait, using decades of Kilmer’s own footage to show the highs, the ego, the humor, and the cost of a life performed on and off camera. When it works, it’s unusually personal and occasionally moving, especially in how it frames creativity, family, and the reality of illness without turning into tabloid sludge. But if you’re hoping for a tightly structured career retrospective, deep dives into specific films, or a balanced “outside” perspective, this can feel more like a scrapbook with big emotional swings than a comprehensive documentary. It’s worth your time if you’re already curious about Kilmer the person; if you’re not, the raw health-and-grief material and the loose, impressionistic pacing may feel heavy and a bit self-mythologizing.