Review of Stories We Tell (2012) by Barry S — 24 Apr 2013

This film crosses over the line of what some would call documentary, but that's sort of the point. In dramatizing interpreted retellings of the past, Sarah Polley directs the story of her own being, shaping it into the object of her own focus and polishing only the corners of the mirror she wants to show the world.

It is an engaging history, told with seeming candor, though the participants willingly admit bias and possibly inaccurate recollection. It's not clear (even to herself, it seems) what Polley's vision was at the outset, what she's created is interesting on several levels, the strongest of which being an exploration of the act of storytelling itself.