#tim wardle

Three Identical Strangers

2018. Documentary

By Tim Wardle

About: the lives of Edward Galland, David Kellman, and Robert Shafran, a set of identical triplets adopted as infants by separate families. 

Country: United States

I had mixed feelings after finding out that the triplets finally get their own documentary....

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(Hopefully by this point you’ve finished all 96 minutes of 'Three Identical Strangers’, the kind of person who isn’t bothered by spoilers, or are just deciding if you still want to keep watching.)

"It’s a little darker than a Disney movie.”

“Anybody could just walk around the corner and discover that [they] have a twin out there.” Though it comes at the film’s end, this final line of dialogue deeply transformed my entire viewing experience of Three Identical Strangers, from one filled with undeniable and complete empathy to one that was invasively personal, and nearly suffocating. More than evoking empathy, however, this powerful statement essentially frames the provocativeness that this film embodies by questioning one’s previously established beliefs on who or what should be sacrificed for the benefit of all.  

The greatest element of Three Identical Strangers is its intentional and intelligent narrative, that is how director Tim Wardle decides to tell the story of identical triplets Bobby Shafran, David Kellman, and Eddy Galland reuniting after being separated at birth only to eventually be torn apart by the very same cause that separated them in the first place-- an experiment which studied whether nature or nurture matters most in human development. 

In three distinct acts, audiences are literally taken along the triplets’ intimate journey as each new piece of information is presented to viewers in much of the same, linear way it was presented to the three brothers; we rejoice with them when they finally meet up with each other for the first time, we laugh with them as they discover their uncanny similarities, we scratch our heads in angry frustration along them as they question the motives of their adoption agency, and so on. This manner of linear storytelling, combined with the pacing of the documentary as a whole, enables even the most distracted and unsympathetic viewers to remain wholly engaged as they're forced deep into the catacombs of their emotions-- and only deeper into them as the story progresses.

Considering the undeniable immorality of the twin experiment, it is the seeming utter lack of empathy displayed by previous research assistants of the study, specifically Natasha Josefowitz, that affected me just as well. Josefowitz, a small but sprightly woman of 90 years, is introduced to viewers as she walks along her sunny beachfront home. She proudly shows off her array of prized possessions-- framed photographs of her and highly revered celebrities and political figures and several art pieces by Pablo Picasso-- before she impatiently asks the filmmakers, “When are we going to talk about the twin study?” Her joy and simultaneous indifference stands in stark contrast to the previous images we see of Bobby and David, who are distraught and heartbroken in talking about their and their brother’s estrangement and its detrimental effects that came at the cost of scientific advancement. I was almost personally offended on behalf of the triplets at this woman’s reaction, which, to me, felt like sociopathic disassociation. (Author’s Note: I recognize that my anger may be misdirected as she wasn’t in charge of this experiment, but Josefowitz for me represents the researchers and supporters of the study who remain unbothered by the damages the study itself has had on its subjects).

It’s hard for me to consider that the ethics of the 1950s are vastly different in comparison to the ethics of our present time. Still, it’s one thing for someone to recognize how ethical differences can change with time and adjust their feelings accordingly; it’s another thing for someone to recognize this difference and not care anyway. Natasha Josefowitz starts off her interview by saying she wasn’t a main researcher on the twin study, then defends the study by stating that the advent of psychology was more prominent than ethical concerns. Most disturbing of all, she attributes any anger someone may have upon discovering the experiment or its findings to people feeling upset about “how little influence they have, how little control they have.” She seems to remain unflinching at the fact that her shared mentality caused the destruction of the beautiful and potentially long-lasting familial relationship.

Three Identical Strangers (2018) Dir. Tim Wardle, Cin. Tim Cragg

05/04/2020

My pal Mitto had been on at me for about a year and a half to watch this, so I saw it was on netflix, and watched it twice over the past two weeks : first by myself in my kitchen and second with my parents on a Thursday

- this is one of those stories that if you thought it up people would think it was way too outlandish and over the top. But it’s a true story, and that’s completely mad

- I think mark twain said that made up stories have to be believable and real life can do whatever the fuck it wants (or words to that effect)

- the bit at the beginning when bobby called eddy and they did his voice over the phone was AMAZING

- then fuck oh my god the middle section

- it was so stressful

- the music, all the realisations and the facts that we’d already been told but repeated in a different context were TERRIFYING

- the reconstructed stuff wasn’t overdone and worked well in tandem with all of footage that they already had, which was incredible by the way

- my family doesn’t have any videos or stuff from when me and my sister were kids so it was really cool to see all the films they had

- that in parallel with all the creepy study films they showed at the end from when they were literal children was Disturbing

- it was crazy seeing how young they all were when there was this whole media circus around them and it never really stopped

- like they were still doing interviews about what had happened decades after

- and the difference in all of them between those years was heartbreaking

- like initially they were so excited and it was such a crazy story and such an amazing time for all of them to be together

- then in the later interviews they get asked the same questions from ten years before about the strange similarities they discovered and one of them says that it’s annoying and unnerving when you think you have a unique thought, you tell someone and they say that one of your brothers just told them the exact same thing

- i had a micro extistential crisis when it finished and then I realised I wasn’t adopted

- and then I was like “OR WAS I”

- I did hear about this woman who saw it and she was adopted and the agency was Louise wise and she found her twin because of this film which is mad

- structurally I think it got a bit wavey towards the end and I wasn’t 100 % what their focus was and i feel like it could have been maybe twenty minutes shorter but it’s difficult to cut anything out of this

- neither of my parents had heard of this which was strange cos they were alive then and about the same age as the triplets

- guess they lived under rocks

- there was a bit that made me really sad when bobby was talking about eddy and you could tell he was a bit emotional but he finished the bit he was saying. Then someone behind camera said “Ok, thank you bobby” and he just went “oh, you’re welcome” and sat back