Polley divorced her first husband in and remarried in During the making of the film, her sisters also divorced their spouses. On the upside, the experience afforded her the opportunity to more intimately understand her mother. Even so, Polley said she was beset by self-doubt, constantly questioning what she felt was an irrational need to make the movie.
Polley credits the organization with pushing her to persevere when she was ready to abandon the project. I knew better not to do it and yet I kept doing it. All Sections. About Us. Joseph Communications uses cookies for personalization, to customize its online advertisements, and for other purposes. Learn more or change your cookie preferences. By continuing to use our service, you agree to our use of cookies.
We use cookies why? You can change cookie preferences. Her film may be her story — but she gets others to tell it. Michael Polley, her British-born father — an actor who worked for an insurance company — at one dramatic point says he will not try to "guess" what Sarah's thoughts are. But I can do nothing else. And now, on an overcast, humid morning, I am hurrying to meet her in downtown Toronto, through streets that seem a cross between Dalston and Cape Cod.
Every other ramshackle shop seems to be attempting to evolve into an art gallery. One shop promises to waylay passers by and teach them how to knit.
I pass more than one itinerant woman in shabby chic clothes. The lady is not a tramp — the tramp is a lady. I have never seen a city with glossier, better tended roses. And now here it is: Cafe Diplomatico, Little Italy, nicknamed "the Dip", which has been open for business for 45 years — a Toronto landmark. I sit in the shade and wait. A tiny figure, with a tentative tread, appears on the pavement opposite.
I decide it cannot be Sarah. But it is. Dainty as a dancer, she is wearing a blue denim jacket, a scarlet shirt and sneakers to match. She has a transparent complexion and guileless smile. Everything about her, including her handshake, has a lightness of touch — like her work.
What is different is that she is hospitably voluble. We break the ice — not that there is much to break — with talk of Toronto. She fills me in on an "epic disaster of the mayor who has been accused of smoking crack" he denies it but otherwise describes the city as "diverse, tolerant, multicultural".
She adds: "I love living here — I have always lived here, it is an easy city. She orders brunch "two eggs over easy with bacon and HP sauce". She already has a classy track record as a film director. In , her second film, Take This Waltz — a love story starring Michelle Williams — split opinion I loved it; Peter Bradshaw in the Guardian could barely contain his contempt. All Polley's films, in different ways, explore marriage and its complexities with compassionate grace.
And Stories We Tell , five years in the making, is no exception. It is a cine-memoir of Sarah's parents, an extended family's portrait of itself. And it includes a stunning secret it would spoil the film's delicate detective work to spill it. Besides, what gives the film its distinction are the questions it raises that reach beyond plot: do we own our own stories or do they own us? Is there such a thing as emotional copyright? And why is memory a teasing resource? Michael Polley is the film's chief narrator.
For years, he was an author in search of a subject. Now Sarah has given him one. His quirky, engagingly self-deprecatory commentary contributes hugely to the film's charm. Like a father surveying his family from the head of a dining table, he reads aloud, savouring the narrative. Even when it is at its most uncomfortable, he seems in his element.
We've got millions". I had a lot of opportunities to end up in some pretty bad situations and, despite all my faults, I had the sense to find someone like him and make the decision to be with him. You spend a lot of time wanting to be with the wrong person and I just feel incredibly lucky because I've succeeding at that one thing. I figured that out". I'm really comfortable in sadness so I don't get depressed doing stuff like that. I actually find it invigorating. It was an amazing experience.
Atom Egoyan is a filmmaker who I really respect and I felt like I had his trust". If you have the opportunity to do things which have some meaning I don't know why you would choose to do other things. I understand that many people don't have that opportunity but I do right now so I'm happy to hold out for the films which have something to contribute. I mean, I work there, and I like being there, but I love having an anonymous life. I think there's definitely such a thing as being too famous.
The reason why I stayed in Canada had everything to do with the kind of films we used to make before the commercial mandate came in effect at Telefilm. They were films that asserted an independent vision of the world. They weren't just cheap versions of American genre films Now, I'm beginning to wonder why I stayed and if it was a huge mistake.
We're beginning to freak out a little. Why make a commitment with so little reward? The Canadian films out there have been so weak, it's been kind of depressing". It was the opposite kind of love than we usually celebrate in films, which is new love without knowledge and without hardship. It's the whole idea of love after life has had its way with you, and after you have kind of failed each other and things have gone off the rails.
Yet love still somehow exists between them" - AP interview on Away from Her That's something I find is really missing in films that portray love between people in their 60s or 70s. It generally lacks chemistry, like somehow that's all died away, and that's just not my experience of people in their 60s and 70s, that that whole part of yourself disappears somehow. It's a really pessimistic and inaccurate attitude that a lot of films have had, so it was really important for me to have that vibrancy between them, because I've seen it in relationships that have lasted that long.
I'm thrilled but kind of in shock too. It's been such a strange year and I'm bowled over by the life of the film. It's more than I could have ever hoped. This now adds a very surreal element to it. I think that what a lot of first-time filmmakers don't realize is that they are the least experienced person on that set. Everybody else has been doing their job for years, so the whole act of playing the filmmaker, playing the person in command, is a charade.
I think it takes a lot of focus and determination to stay in a relationship with film and acting that's productive and stimulating. Acting can be the most shallow, vapid things you can do with your life, but it can also be one of the most profound experiences in the world.
Even my experience acting as a child is something I'm very ambiguous about. I'm not sure it was the best way for me to spend my time. But at the same time, I probably wouldn't be where I am now without it. And I'm very happy with where I am now. He's also the only one I had in mind when I was writing. He has a depth and a goodness to him that shines through in every role. I don't think we are prepared culturally for the idea that, once the 'happily ever after' happens, there are a lot of complications and sometimes boredom and all kinds of other things.
That's not to say everyone should just stay in a long-term relationship. Certainly that's not the case. But I do feel we are ill-equipped when that first flame of passion dwindles.
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