You might call this knockout debut from Jonathan Caouette, 32, a documentary, since he put it together on a computer for $218 from home movies and other artifacts of growing up gay and lving in Texas and New York with a mentally damaged mother. From age eleven, Caouette sidesteps trauma with musicals, horror flicks and pop-culture remnants that heal his psychic wounds. The result is a film that defies description. I'd call it some kind of miracle.

“Is It True”

As the British Invasion reached its peak in 1964, Brenda Lee went from Nashville to London to record one of her hardest-rocking hits, her perky vocal backed by a stuttering, squalling guitar. That guitar was played by session musician Jimmy Page, yet to skyrocket to fame with first the Yardbirds and then Led Zeppelin. "She said to me, 'I've come here to make a record with the British sound,'" remembered producer Mickie Most. "She felt she wouldn't get the same sound in Nashville because they're only just catching up on the British beat group sound of about six months ago."