My Architect

Movies today rarely touch chords that are spiritual or deeply emotional, but Nathaniel Kahn's remarkable documentary My Architect: A Son's Journey does both.

Absorbing, beautiful documentary.

What a sad film this, and how filled with the mystery of human life.

What makes it enthralling is the younger Kahn's openness to a range of emotional responses (his own and others') to his father's life above and below board, and his readiness to turn his own predicament into both entertainment and a provisional kind of puckish wisdom.

It is a stunning work that captures with elegance -- and touches of lyricism -- the challenge of finding the man through the artist.

Nathaniel will sometimes take it too far. It's particularly distracting, and even a little distancing, when he waits till the end of a lengthy interview to tell one of his father's former collaborators and friends that he is Louis' son.

A fascinating look at a bizarre man and a brilliant talent. But a good deal of the movie is described by its subtitle -- "A Son's Journey'' -- and to the extent it is, the movie sags.