Movie spotlight: The Swell Season

In the 2007 art-house hit "Once," you get the sense that you are watching two people so in tune with each other that they can't help falling in love. When the two performers -- veteran singer-guitarist Glen Hansard and young pianist and singer Marketa Irglova -- fell in love in real life, it made the movie, and the music they created in it, all the more endearing. But could their relationship endure their newfound fame -- and, worse, life on the road? Fans of the duo, who perform as the Swell Season, likely know the answer. The documentary "The Swell Season" follows their path intimately, from cuddles to cursing and back again. The result, shot over a three-year period in black and white, isn't so much a companion to "Once" as an epilogue. While showing their struggles, "The Swell Season" reveals how making music intensified their relationship at first. With the exception of a few gentle comments from others in the tour's entourage, "The Swell Season" lets Hansard and Irglova tell their story, in song, on stage and to each other. The intimacy that results is candid and simple as the movie that, for good and ill, put them both center-stage in the first place. (Unrated.)