Stories We Tell recounts actor and filmmaker Sarah Polley?s family history through a variety of storytellers: her father, siblings, and other relatives and friends. At issue is the filmmaker?s origin. Is her father her real biological father, an actor, or was she the product of a lurid love affair between her mother and another actor? For much of the documentary, the filmmaker lets questions rise and fall, linger and ferment. We get the story from many angles; seeming facts are submerged by contradictory evidence; seeming home video footage slowly reveals itself as staged reenactments. Then, the question that has been haunting throughout, something along the lines of ?are you just trying to avoid having to face your own reaction to your own origin and enigmatic paternal heritage?? Like everything else here the answer is yes and no, maybe and likely, probably and perhaps not. Stories We Tell is an exploration of contradiction in truth, doubt in memory, and the ephemeral nature of history.
Polley?s mother was a vivacious firecracker and an actress, and she fell for Polly?s father, or perhaps more accurately, the roles he played on stage. They had two kids, but a decade into the marriage, the passion had more than dampened. Then came Polley?s mother?s summer in Montreal, the bars and the actors and fun. Nine months later, Polley is born. Years after that the family jokes began: were you the love child of our mother?s affair in Montreal? Even Polley?s father laughed along. But in 2009, Polley decided to investigate.
Another question that is asked early in the film by one of Polley?s siblings is why we should care about Sarah Polley?s story? After all, every family has its secrets and unexplored legacies. The answer to that question is, in part, that we care precisely because Polley is an artist, which is to say, Polley displays a unique ability and sensitivity to take what is a personal saga and give it universal importance. If you saw Polley?s last film, Take This Waltz, Stories We Tell will help frame what mindset the filmmaker was in when she made that movie. Like the fiction, the facts ? as far as we can be certain of them ? involve a woman in pursuit of the passion, love, and excitement she doesn?t find in her marriage.
And yet the documentary is more than an exploration of a love affair, it is an exploration of how we create histories, how unreliable memories and rumor create narratives that come to define ourselves. It is a remarkable, meditative, and moving film, one that belongs on the shelf next to Werner Herzog?s similar explorations of truth in documentary form, and L.M. Kit Carson?s lampooning of verite, David Holzman?s Diary.
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