Documentary Entry 11

Before I started doing this class a sentence I never uttered (because it wouldn't make sense to at any point and even in its current context it's still pretty weird) would have been "I never thought I'd see a documentary with a plot twist".

Now thanks to the phenomenal Searching For the Sugarman and this film Stories We Tell by Sarah Polley I can list two documentaries with plot twists. See before I started this class I always assumed that documentaries being based in the realm of reality (a place I'm growing to tolerate more as I watch these) and thus didn't have room for the
sort of elements featured in fiction.

For crying out loud Sugarman stretched the boundaries to begin with but the film built up to the reveal so well you'd think Christopher Nolan had done it.
Of course this film (and Sugarman too actually) don't go for the shocked squirrel Hollywood approach mainly because as I've said documentaries are based in the realm of reality and in the realm of reality most people don't react the way they do in films unless they're on American news, won an American game show or are in fact American.

The plot twist about Sarah's biological father isn't treated like some Breaking Bad shocking swerve there's no bouts of denial, no tears, no thrown arguments or anything like that. And yet it actually invokes a better reaction and likely because of it too because the emotion is real and tears crocodilian or otherwise aren't needed. A viewer can see the anguish there in front of them. Something a lot of film directors could probably learn to work with cause it's a hell of a lot better than "you are sad, this scene indicates you are sad, make a sad face"

It's a haunting reveal and probably hits harder with someone older than me (I'm only 19 so I haven't really learned which facet of reality of despise the least) and it makes one question the selfs around them because the film gives no indication of the route it's about to take and when it does it hits like a punch to the gut.

The fact that this whole thing is being narrated by the man who up until that point we the audience believed to be Sarah's father makes it even worse.
On a final note. Well done to Sarah Polley for this. This is one of the best ways you do the shocking swerve nowadays because it's a shocking swerve. There's a power to it and it's great because of it not in spite of it.