What was it exactly about Marlon Brando? From his iconic roles in A Streetcar Named Desire, The Wild One and On the Waterfront to the peripatetic career that took him from Last Tango in Paris to The Godfather and Apocalypse Now, "Marlon brought all of that raw, surprising, dynamic humanity to everything that he did," says Sean Penn. Featuring interviews with actors from Al Pacino to Johnny Depp; directors including Bernardo Bertolucci, Arthur Penn and Martin Scorsese; friends; girlfriends; children; rare interviews with Brando himself; and never-before-seen footage including his screen test for Rebel Without a Cause and a home movie made with Montgomery Clift, this definitive documentary illuminates the enigmatic star who turned down the usual scripts to make "message" movies, and went far beyond typical Hollywood liberal support of the civil rights movement to get involved with both the Black Panthers and Native American activists. From his early days in small town America to his life in Tahiti, from his first extortionist contract (on the troubled Mutiny on the Bounty) to his later earpiece-assisted performances, late-night phone calls and lost promise, the man who gave "The Method" a carnal edge--and changed Hollywood forever--may remain a mystery, but he wouldn't want it any other way. "When people struggle to be real, they're dishwater," says Penn. "When people struggle to protect themselves from their own reality, they're Marlon Brando." -Ann Lewinson