Kristen Stewart arrived 15 minutes late on Thursday to a press conference for “Personal Shopper,” one of her many films this year. She was met by a round of applause. “I was on time. He was early,” she joked, and pointed to director Olivier Assayas.

Stewart looked terrific in a low-cut tuxedo jacket, vest and trouser. Stewart is refreshingly candid, bright and unfiltered

“Personal Shopper,” which screens at the New York Film Festival, reunites Kristen Stewart with French director Olivier Assayas. They had great success with their last film, “Clouds of Sils Maria,” which earned the actress both a Cesar and a New York Film Critics Award.

The film is a supernatural thriller in which Kristen Stewart plays Maureen, a personal shopper who obtains pricey and chic outfits for her what seems her one high-profile customer. She also communicates with the dead and is desperately trying to reconnect with her twin, who recently died of a heart attack.

During the press conference for the film Thursday afternoon, the director said of his rapport with Stewart, “What’s extraordinary with Kristen is how smart she is in understanding the most intricate complexities of cinema, of filmmaking, of what is going on with the shot. She recreates the character from the inside and she does it knowingly, but at the same time she’s guided by her body.”

In “Personal Shopper” there’s a surprising sex scene; Maureen is in bed masturbating – in pricey Chanel flimsies – while she’s texting and being texted by a ghostly presence or human being. At this point no one cares because this is a pretty hot scene.

“Literally, Maureen is interacting with some thing on a phone, and like my heart started racing,” noted Stewart. “Some of the sexiest shit I’ve done onscreen I’m alone! I was like, ‘Oh my god, that is crazy, and that’s what people do all the time. That’s insane! Such massive disconnection, yet you’re just fabricating a wonderful reality. That’s not less real, it’s just perception.”

Then a journalist asked Stewart if she could break down her own outfit? Does she have a personal shopper?

“It’s a jacket and a vest and pants. I have a stylist. She’s rad,” noted Stewart. “But I choose my shit. I don’t like getting dressed by someone. This isn’t mine. We just borrow this stuff and go thanks! And then we give it back. They’ll all be getting this stuff back.”

Does Stewart believe in ghosts and has she had paranormal experiences someone asked?

Stewart said she and the director had many late night conversations about this very subject.

“If it’s real for you, then what the hell else is there? And like there’s so much that we don’t see that we know to be true” and so “I think it’s self protective like a reduction of what it is by saying, ‘Do you believe in ghosts or not? Have they touched you?’ Well what else doesn’t touch you that exists? I don’t know what the fuck energy it is, whatever, there’s something that doesn’t go away, and whether I’m making that up or I’m actually being left with some like residual debris, I feel people fucking intrinsically. I think it leaves shadows.”

Photo c2016 Showbiz411 by Paula Schwartz

You know, I loved Mike Mills’ 2005 debut, “Thumbsucker.” It’s a must- rent if you haven’t seen it. Then a couple of years ago he directed Christopher Plummer to an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in “Beginners.”

Now Mills brings us his original screenplay, directing “20th Century Women” and most definitely bringing Annette Bening to the top 5 performances by women this year. She may finally get her Oscar after waiting and being snubbed in “Being Julia,” “American Beauty,” “The American President,” and “The Grifters.” At least.

Bening plays Dorothea, raised in the Depression and now raising a teenage boy in 1979 Santa Barbara as single mother. Mills has created a unique character for Bening, who plays the part without makeup or even a hair comb. Dorothea is a 55 year old woman (about Bening’s age) wrestling with monumental social changes as her son comes of age. Sensing her deficiencies, she appoints two deputies– Greta Gerwig’s Abbie and Elle Fanning’s Julie– to help her. They are then three women in different orbits, all bringing Jamie (Lucas Jade Zumann) into some kind of manhood.

“20th Century Women” joins “Manchester by the Sea” as another completely original, outstanding story not adapted from anything. Like Kenny Lonergan, Mills is a real writer, with a terrific ear. He’s empathetic and  just melancholy enough to  pull off a beautiful ensemble piece that should earn him a Best Picture nomination and many other citations for excellence. The humor is sly and there are plenty of organic laughs. Mills is exploring a lot of things in retrospect here, especially the women’s movement. A lot of things that seemed like New Age in 1979 are taken for granted now.

All the actors, including Billy Crudup as a kind of lost post-hippie who lives in Dorothea’s rambling house, shine. They’re aided by voice over narration detailing backstories of each character as if they were part of a novel. This works wonders because the most layered information about each character, the better.

But in the end, it’s Bening’s movie. Her Dorothea wise, winning and funny. Women should flock to this film, single mothers especially. “20th Century Women” rings true on every level.