Lykke Li, Before the Identity Set

Youth Knows No Pain is a documentary shot during Lykke Li’s early touring years—a portrait of a Swedish artist discovering what she wanted to say at roughly the same speed as her audience was discovering her. Director Frelle Petersen follows her across stages and hotel rooms and the specific nowhere-space of tour bus transit, and what comes through isn’t a victory lap. She was young, she was clearly good, and the film catches her before either of those things had fully hardened into identity. That unsettled quality is the thing worth watching.