Top GunandBatman Foreverstar Val Kilmer is at the center of a new, intimate documentary. DubbedVal, the project is produced by A24 and was recently acquired by Amazon Studios in the U.S. and Latin America. It is directed by Leo Scott and Ting Poo, though Kilmer was personally heavily involved with the documentary, which includes a mix of behind-the-scenes footage and various interviews to help tell the actor’s story.
“At least once a day for years I looked around and got this bittersweet feeling that there are a thousand reasons that this project could’ve been shipwrecked,“Val Kilmertold THR in a statement. “I mean, what could a film look like of a man filming himself, sometimes daily, years at a time? It is unimaginable that this movie actually could’ve ever come to light without the partnership of my dear friends, Leo and Ting, and my producing partners.”
Valis the first in a planned series of documentariesin the works at A24under the guidance of Ben Cotner. A logline for the Kilmer documentary reads: “This raw, wildly original and unflinching documentary reveals a life lived to extremes and a heart-filled, sometimes hilarious look at what it means to be an artist and a complex man.”
For four decades, Kilmer has been documenting his own life as he navigated his career as an actor, accumulating thousands of hours of footage. This dates all the way back to making home movies with a 16mm camera with his brothers to footage taken from the sets of some of Kilmer’s biggest projects, likeTop Gun,The Doors,Tombstone, andBatman Forever.
Kilmer’s health took a turn for the worse in recent years. Due to a two-year battle with throat cancer, the actor had undergone chemotherapy treatments along with a procedure on his trachea that has given him a raspy voice. Last year, Kilmer said he had since been cancer-free for four years, but he could only eat with a feeding tube after having multiple tracheotomies.
Valis produced by Boardwalk Pictures' Andrew Fried, Dane Lillegard, Jordan Wynn, Ali Alborzi and Brad Koepenick alongside Scott of Cartel Films and Poo. A release date hasn’t yet been set, but it’s rumored that the doc could make its world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival this summer. It will be released by Amazon Studios later this year as well. Fans can also look forward to catching Kilmer back on the big screen whenTop Gun: Maverickpremieres in theaters on Nov. 19. This news comes to us fromThe Hollywood Reporter.
