Desperate for answers about the theft of her 2 paintings, a Czech artist seeks out and befriends the career criminal who stole them. After inviting her thief to sit for a portrait, the two form an improbable relationship and an inextricable bond that will forever link these lonely souls.

It’s impossible not to wheel out the aphorism that truth is stranger than fiction when faced with this astonishing documentary. A slippery, reflexive study in compassion and portraiture, The Painter and the Thief confronts the ethical boundaries of art as a tool for intervention and recovery.