The Imposter (2012)
A creatively made documentary about a French man who was able to take on the identity of someone else against all the odds. This isn't a wild tale like the man who was doctor and airplane pilot and so on, but rather just a young man posing as a kid so he could get into a children's home and be taken care of.
Or that was step one. When he was about to be discovered he then pulls one charade after another and ends up in Texas. The gullibility of the family who takes him in is part of the talking head zaniness of it all.
Or so that's step two. Or four. The movie takes a whole series of twists because of how the story is told to us. (There is a little feeling of being manipulated and tricked which doesn't feel quite fair, actually, but this does keep you interested.) By the end you know exactly what happened (with one major detail up in the air) and there is a satisfying, wow, what a tale feeling.
The filming is really elegant, with really brilliant editing. I think it could have been more compact, and more impactful, but it never really slows down. The cast of characters gradually grows as the investigation into the facts changes, too, which is interesting, leading to the best character of all (beyond the French leading man), an old gumshoe driving his Cadillac and getting to the bottom of at least some of the facts the old fashioned way.
You might critique this kind of story by simply saying it would make an amazing amazing segment on 60 Minutes. But that would be 20 fabulous minutes. Instead it's stretched and stretched into five times that (five!) and all the extra details and atmospheric filler makes it very long. Boring? No, not really, but when you're done you'll know it could have been more by being less.
A creatively made documentary about a French man who was able to take on the identity of someone else against all the odds. This isn't a wild tale like the man who was doctor and airplane pilot and so on, but rather just a young man posing as a kid so he could get into a children's home and be taken care of.
Or that was step one. When he was about to be discovered he then pulls one charade after another and ends up in Texas. The gullibility of the family who takes him in is part of the talking head zaniness of it all.
Or so that's step two. Or four. The movie takes a whole series of twists because of how the story is told to us. (There is a little feeling of being manipulated and tricked which doesn't feel quite fair, actually, but this does keep you interested.) By the end you know exactly what happened (with one major detail up in the air) and there is a satisfying, wow, what a tale feeling.
The filming is really elegant, with really brilliant editing. I think it could have been more compact, and more impactful, but it never really slows down. The cast of characters gradually grows as the investigation into the facts changes, too, which is interesting, leading to the best character of all (beyond the French leading man), an old gumshoe driving his Cadillac and getting to the bottom of at least some of the facts the old fashioned way.
You might critique this kind of story by simply saying it would make an amazing amazing segment on 60 Minutes. But that would be 20 fabulous minutes. Instead it's stretched and stretched into five times that (five!) and all the extra details and atmospheric filler makes it very long. Boring? No, not really, but when you're done you'll know it could have been more by being less.