Don't mistake this spellbinder from Canadian writer-director Jean-Claude Lauzon for a childhood lark The film opens with a dirty old man in Sicily jerking off into a stack of tomatoes, which are shipped to Montreal, where they spill from their crate. After a woman (Ginette Reno) trips and falls on them, a doctor removes a sperm-covered fruit from her vagina. Too late, she's pregnant. Anyway, that's how twelve-year-old Léolo (Maxime Collin) imagines he was born an Italian trapped in a dysfunctional family of French Canadians.

Mom and Dad are obsessed with bowel movements, Léolo's bodybuilder brother is a coward, his sisters are certifiable, and his sadistic grandfather, whom Léolo tries to kill, hires a young girl to sit in his tub and chew on his toenails. The boy escapes through fantasy and writing. For all its perversity and piercing wit, Léolo emerges as a lyrical film of surprising warmth. Lauzon is a talent to watch.

“Youth Knows No Pain”

“Like on 'Youth Knows No Pain' — we are the ones that should demonstrate, because we can take it,” Likke Li said. “We can pierce ourselves, take Ecstasy, dance all night and still go to work at our McDonald's jobs.” Despite the hedonistic sentiment in the song, the Swedish singer also admitted in hindsight her youth had repercussions. “I remember when I was 18-19 and feeling that I know it all,” Li said. “I always feel that I know it all. But that song is about realizing you don’t, and reflecting, ‘Boy, if I only knew what would follow.’”