Stories We Tell

Actress-turned-director Sarah Polley sets her gaze toward her own family history—and her remarkable, remarkably unconventional mother—in this moving, constantly surprising documentary on home life, marriage, and female independence. Polley and cinematographer Iris Ng weave between straightforward, shot-on-digital first-person interviews and more romanticized, gauzy fictional Super 8mm “home movies” to capture the life lived and decisions made by Polley’s mother, Diane, a vivacious force of nature who passed away when Sarah was only eleven. Sarah’s father, siblings, and stepsiblings vie to create narratives to hold her multitudes, but the truth—as it’s slowly revealed—is even more surprising. “Revelatory” (Manohla Dargis, New York Times).