‘Val’: Will we see a young Val Kilmer in this tell-all documentary?

On Tuesday, July 6th, just a day before its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, the trailer for the upcoming Amazon Studios documentary Val was released. So what is the anticipated film going to be all about? 

Well, as the name suggests, the documentary will be giving viewers an inside look at everything about legendary actor Val Kilmer, as we watch his life from when he was young to now. Let’s take a look at all the details here.

All about Val Kilmer

So what will the upcoming Val film be all about, and what can viewers expect to see and learn from the upcoming Amazon documentary? In the trailer, a narrator states: “My name is Val Kilmer; I’m an actor. I’ve lived a magical life and captured quite a bit of it. I was the first guy I knew to own a video camera”. During this voiceover, snippets of Val Kilmer are shown throughout his life from when he was young to videos of him now. 

A lot of the footage that will be shown in the full movie will be firsthand footage shot by Val Kilmer all throughout his life from when he was young all the way to the milestones in his acting career up until now. In the trailer, there are even accounts of the star-making 16 mm home movies with his brother, showing that Val Kilmer has always had a love for documenting his life and journey ever since he got his hands on a camera. 

Some of the footage that is shown in the trailer even includes a young Val Kilmer behind the scenes for legendary blockbusters he starred in such as Top Gun, Batman Forever, Tombstone, The Doors, and more. Even his acting pals Sean Penn & Kevin Bacon made an appearance in the trailer. If you’re a fan of his movies and want to get some behind-the-scenes clips of the star’s life, this movie should definitely be a must-watch. 

More about the film

Throughout the trailer, we see images and clips of Val Kilmer from when he was young all the way to the man he is today, and the film actually spans four whole decades! The movie pulls from thousands of hours of footage that has been filmed by the star himself throughout his lifetime. From the trailer alone, it seems that the documentary will have its exciting moments, but it won’t shy away from some deeper topics as well. 

In the clips that we’ve seen so far, Val Kilmer opened up about his throat cancer diagnosis, and that the actor was still recovering from it which makes it hard for him to speak. This was what had inspired the star to tell his story through film more than ever. Val Kilmer said: “I spent decades finding my voice through characters. I’ve tried to see the world as one piece of life”, as the song “Where is My Mind” by The Pixies played. 

In an earlier statement, Val Kilmer expressed his own thoughts on the upcoming documentary about him, and he shared that “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. I mean, what could a film look like of a man filming himself, sometimes daily, years at a time?”

The star then added: “It is unimaginable that this movie actually could’ve ever come to light without the partnership of my dear friends, Leo [Scott] and Ting [Poo], and my producing partners. Tireless hours of editing and endless emotions with each new cut! I couldn’t be more proud to share this with the world!” The movie will be released on Amazon Prime Video on August 6th and will hit the movie theaters on July 23rd. 

The movie will also be distributed through production company A24 which has commonly been hailed as one of the best film production companies out there, having Oscar and Golden Globe Award-winning films like Moonlight, Lady Bird, Minari, Uncut Gems, and tons more classics under its belt. So who knows? Maybe we’ll be seeing Val in the documentary category at next year’s Oscar Awards nominations.