Acclaimed and endlessly inventive director Michel Gondry trains the camera on his own family—in particular, his aunt Suzette. A schoolteacher in France for over thirty years, Suzette serves as the Gondry family matriarch as well as tour guide for the film, while the viewer (and conspicuous film crew) accompany her to former schools and locales. She proves to be a complex and contradictory subject, as is her son, Gondry’s cousin Jean-Yves. For those familiar with the director’s body of work, The Thorn in the Heart is predictably unpredictable and delivers with characteristic flourish. For the uninitiated, expect a personal and unconventional charm bracelet of a film, crowded with tokens of curious affection and bittersweet reminiscence.  TM