Suited (HBOGo/HBONow)

A brief synopsis of Suited, the new Lena Dunham-produced documentary, is simple: Rae Tutera and Daniel Friedman are New York-based tailors who specialize in custom-made suits for transgender and gender non-conforming clients who have trouble feeling comfortable in off-the-rack options. The film, by first-time documentarian Jason Benjamin, does a lot more than merely tell the story of one store. It expands itself to include six different customers who come through the doors of Bindle & Keep. It follows these customers home and lets their individual stories come to life: they need suits for their weddings, birthdays, court appearances, bar mitzvahs, and job interviews, and Benjamin uses the common thread of Bindle & Keep merely as a launching pad to dive into each of their own struggles and accomplishments.

If this sounds like a typical documentary, in many ways it is. There is nothing novel about the structure of Suited, which has been used hundreds of times before, nor the way that that structure plays out. What is unique is the honest way that Benjamin tells these stories. He manages to get the most out of each of his subjects, all of whom have a similar yet vastly different journey to share and none of which are afraid to let their pain and hope play out on screen. The camera often lingers on them for a little longer than may seem comfortable, especially at the times when Tutera and Friedman’s clients try on their suits for the first time, but it lets you register the mix of emotions going on. These moments are incredibly powerful, but they are only a small piece of the power of Suited. Every moment spent with these men and women, meeting the families that support them, hearing about the families that shun them and witnessing the daily difficulties they face, is a powerful reminder of the humanity behind each and every one of these people. Benjamin puts a face on a topic that is increasingly political and makes a beautiful case that everyone deserves the basic human right to feel comfortable in a piece of clothing.