STORIES WE TELL

Canadian actress turned filmmaker Sarah Polley turns the camera on her own family and friends for this fascinating documentary which could have also been titled  ‘All About My Mother’.  To tell her story Polley has enlisted her interview subjects that she calls ‘The Storytellers’ to help piece together the life of her mother Diane Polley who died in 1990 when Sarah was just 12 years old.

Diane Polley from all accounts was a vivacious woman who was determined to live life to the fullest. She was a TV announcer/actress who fell in love with Michael Polley the actor when she saw him performing on the stage.  It turns out that she was more in love with the character he was playing than the man himself as Michael and Diane were complete opposites.  The only two things that they both loved was acting and their children.  From all accounts, Diane felt held back and frustrated by the quiet and introverted man she has chosen for her husband, and jumped at the few opportunities she could get   to have some fun.  This was Diane’s second marriage, her first ending in an acrimonious divorce and losing custody of her two sons.

As Polley interviews her siblings and some of her parent’s friends, there are two very strong narratives that feature very consistently. One is the fact that everybody has their own take on Diane’s life : there is no right or wrong version, but just simply that different people choose to remember essentially the same story in their own way.  ‘Truth about the past is essentially ephemeral’ Polley comments. The second point was the discovery that several interviewees had the notion that Diane had a brief affair whilst on tour and as a result gave birth to Sarah!  Learning that she may in fact have a totally different father after all these years added an intrigue which naturally she was determined to uncover. 

What we learn mainly from all these interviews is that Diana spent her whole life looking for love, whilst Michael, a somewhat frustrated writer too, was more of an observer and it’s his words that provide most of the narration that links the stories together.  The interesting thing is that the final revelation about Sarah’s parentage actually bought her and Michael closer together in the end.

What wasn’t clear until almost the story was concluded is that some of the ‘archive’ footage of the family was in fact newly reconstructed using actors playing the young family, a very effective devise that blurred the lines between documentary and fiction.  We may all have stories of our own like this to tell, but I doubt that we could present them in such a fascinating manner that we would remain so completely intrigued until the very end as with this movie.  

This is the third film that Miss Polley has directed ….. the first being the stunning ‘Away from Her’ with Julie Christie playing a women with Alzheimer’s that got the director an Oscar Nomination.  She is definitely a filmmaker whose output should be on the ‘must see’ list! 

★★★★★★★★