Spain’s Rodrigo Sorogoyen has proven himself a master of the psychological thriller, whether the serial-killer kind (May God Save Us, 2016) the political kind (The Realm, 2018) or the true-crime kind (The Beasts, 2023). The Beloved, his first film in Competition at Cannes, is an incredible achievement that builds on all those films and leaves them standing in the dust, hitting all the same tense throat-clenching beats but somehow transcending genre altogether. Javier Bardem’s career has been building up to this stunning moment, and his character, Esteban Martinez, makes the self-centered film director of Joachim Trier’s Sentimental Value look like Walt Disney by comparison.

The first 20 minutes alone are a masterclass; Esteban takes his seat in a fancy restaurant and orders sparkling water with ice and lemon. Right there, you have his character; Esteban is a recovering alcoholic driven to self-destruction by his volatile temperament and exacting needs as a film director. But we don’t know this yet; it is about to be teased out by the woman he is dining with, someone he hasn’t seen for 13 years and clearly feels bad about leaving. She could be his mistress, since he talks of leaving Spain and starting a new life in New York. She is, however, his daughter; Esteban is a feared and lauded film director who wants to cast her in his latest project, a period drama set in the western Sahara desert.

This is how we meet Emilia Vera (Victoria Luengo), the product of an affair with one of Esteban’s leading ladies, and a strikingly mysterious actress who looks so much like an Almodóvar starlet that it should come as no surprise to learn she already is one. The scene is one of two extended moments that encapsulate the film in two very different movements, and as an opening salvo it is an impressive and almost unbearably awkward back and forth that only becomes more uncomfortable as it goes on — the camera pushes in close and closer as the gloves start to come off, and Emilia lets rip about the time her druggy, violent, estranged father once showed her up at a screening of Kill Bill 2.

Nevertheless, Emilia listens to Esteban’s apparently sincere compliments, about the crummy TV show she’s too good for, joining the all-star international cast in Fuerteventura where she is immediately feels out of her depth. Her first scene, a complicated tracking shot, is ruined when she mistimes her delivery, but Esteban — surprisingly — lets her off the hook, blaming a technical issue and giving her leeway to improvise. The other actors can’t help but quiz her on her famous father, winner of a Best Foreign Film Oscar, while the press ask Esteban much more cynical questions about his reasons for casting her in the first place.

Esteban’s motivation, like the real meaning of the title itself (“The Loved One” in Spanish), is opaque, and unlike many of Sorogoyen’s previous films — which would be nothing without a hefty chunk of moral ambiguity — there is very little in the way of closure. If Esteban wants to do right by Emilia, he’s not very good at that, giving her a self-righteous mini lecture about her incipient alcoholism (“Drinking is f*cking shit,” he thunders). It seems more likely that Esteban wants to exert some kind of control over her, which comes out in the second major sequence, a Kubrickian scene of behind-the-camera peacockery that sees Esteban finally lose his cool, revealing frightening wells of anger that cause the female cinematographer to pack up and go, costing the film two days of shooting.

Amazingly, it is not Emilia that leaves, and the film invites us to ponder on that. It also feeds us questions about the paradox of filmmaking, in which relationships are so often destroyed in the process of creation — Esteban wants truth and authenticity every time, and yet he is constantly retconning his past, pushing away his daughter when she pushes back on his version of their history. By the end there is a clear feeling that Esteban’s art is his real beloved, and Sorogoyen gives us a sense of that with his use of screen ratios and film stock, from classic black-and-white to shimmering color and grainy video-assist: Esteban always has the scene in his head (and Sorogoyen’s Godardian use of score underlines that).

Certainly one of the best films about filmmaking since François Truffaut’s Day for Night, The Beloved may be the scariest since Peeping Tom. Unwittingly, Esteban makes this observation himself when he quotes Ingmar Bergman’s muse Liv Ullmann in defense of his perfectionist, naturalist style: “The closer the camera, the more the mask must slip,” he tells Emilia. Which is great advice from one actor to another, but closer to a Death Row confession coming from a director.

Title: The Beloved
Festival: Cannes (Competition)
Director/screenwriter: Rodrigo Sorogoyen
Cast: Javier Bardem, Victoria Luengo, Melina Matthews, Marina Fois, Malena Villa
Sales: Goodfellas
Running time: 2 hrs 15 mins

Documentarian Brian Lindstrom, who directed and produced Lost Angel: The Genius of Judee Sill, died at the age of 65 yesterday morning, his wife, Wild and Tiny Beautiful Things author Cheryl Strayed, announced on Instagram.

“Brian Lindstrom died this morning the way he lived—with gentleness and courage, grace and gratitude for his beautiful life,” she wrote. “Our children, Carver and Bobbi, and I held him as he took his last breath and we will hold him forever in our hearts. The only thing more immense than our sorrow that Progressive Supranuclear Palsy took our beloved Brian from us is the endless love we have for him.”

“What tremendous luck it was to be his partner for more than thirty years. We loved each other and our kids with deep devotion and true delight. He was a stellar husband. He was the most magnificent dad. He was a man whose every word and deed was driven by kindness, compassion, and generosity. He saw the goodness in everyone. He believed that we are all sacred and redeemable,” she continued.

In her dedication, Strayed said Lindstrom was driven to shine on a spotlight on those “society puts an X through” through his feature films. “He erased that X with his camera and his astonishing heart. He made films about incarcerated moms and their kids, about people with mental illness and substance use disorders, about teens living in homeless shelters, foster care, and detention centers, about people who were at the bottom and trying to climb up.”

As a director, his credits include Alien Boy: The Life and Death of James Chasse, which he also co-wrote and produced, as well as shorts Mothering Inside and Community Acupuncture: The Calmest Revolution Ever Staged.

Strayed added, “He showed them to us so we’d see what he saw: that every one of us is deserving of love and respect; mercy and honor. Again and again, he went to the darkness to show us how much light is there. He was of service. He spoke truth to power. He measured his success by asking if his films made an impact—and they did. They saved programs and people; changed lives, policies, and minds. They made people feel seen, heard, and believed. They softened the world with their empathy.”

A rare neurological disorder that affects mobility, balance and eye movements, PSP is caused by damage to nerve cells in areas of the brain that control thinking and motor skills. The disease tends to progress rapidly.

Late last month, Strayed announced that Lindstrom had been diagnosed “with a serious, fatal illness.”

“His greatest legacy is Carver and Bobbi, who embody everything good and true about their father,” Strayed concluded in her remembrance post. “Their extraordinary grace, courage, and fortitude during this harrowing time was unfaltering and grounded in the undying love Brian poured into them every day of their lives. We do not know how we will live without him. We’re utterly bereft. We can only walk this dark path and search for the beauty Brian knew was there. It will be his eternal light that guides us.”