Once (2006)

Premise: A busker and vacuum repairman (Glen Hansard) meets a Czech immigrant (Markéta Irglová) who collaborates with him on a number of songs.

There's not much more to it than that, and there shouldn't be either. This film is, by and large, the best picture I have seen all year, and one of the better ones I have seen in my life. Never before has a movie so perfectly captured the magic of artistic collaboration.

It certainly helps that writer-director John Carney's original leads fell through, leading him to cast his friend Hansard and Hansard's friend Irglová. Neither of them are actors, but they are musicians who do everything possible to help us understand and experience for ourselves how unlikely and how pure it is to meet and work with someone else who's gifted.

Hansard and Irglová portray a tentative and moving working class courtship, filtered through their stunning and powerful music (nearly all selections were written by Hansard, Irglová, or both). To see two such talented people fall instantly in sync sends vibrations through the theatre, removing any pessimism or doubt. Carney uses handheld camera work to bring us into their intimate bond, and it never once feels like exploitation or voyeurism. Instead, the warmth between the leads envelopes you, as it does everyone they come in contact with, from a musically inclined bank manager to a collection of other buskers to a tired studio hand.

Their first song will leave you quivering, and the final moments will break you all the way down. It's raw and poignant and immediate in a way that so movies rarely are these days. It is love lost and found that frames this film, and you, too, will find it in watching this film. A+