Save your money for something good and enjoyable

it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

This documentary will stay with you for a long time after viewing and you will still not have answers to your questions. Three babies separated and adopted by three families - all different - and watched over many years. The history of how 2 found each other, and then the third and the publicity that followed. The story gets more interesting and more questions come to mind. The connection of the adoption agency, a Dr. Neubauer, and why??? The interviews with the parents, the assistants to Neubauer, and mostly with the men themselves are amazing in telling this story. A well produced, well written and well told. This is a story I will wonder about for a long time.

One documentary but many interesting topics to discuss & many real life questions raised by 'Three Identical Strangers'. Let me just list a few: nature v. nurture, rapidly changing medical ethics, what traits are hereditary, how much of our actions are preprogrammed & how much do we have control over, what price the society should willingly pay for scientific research & when does it become too high, is knowing the truth so important that we would wrap our life in turmoil or is it better not to know such a truth, should the people who have been targeted and been subjects of experiments be now themselves conducting experiments on their own in the name of science etc. 'Three Identical Strangers' unfortunately does not answer these questions though the scientists did set out long ago by conducting these experiments to answer many of these questions but medical ethics evolved during the experimentation that prevented them from publishing a scientific paper. However, the documentary does provide 'feelings' on these profound topics expressed by many people who were either subjects of study or closely related to the subjects. I was deeply engrossed in the movie due to many of its twists & turns. I highly recommend this documentary if this kind of stuff interests you.

Three Identical Strangers is a documentary to die for: it has camera-ready, outgoing triplet brothers, who discover each other 19 years after birth (1980), become media darlings, and provide filmmaker Tim Wardle with one of the best thrillers of the year. Read this review but not those that will disclose the mysterious underpinnings of one of the best docs this year. Yes, things do not all turn well after the initial exaltation over their finding each other. The doc expertly distributes the dark revelations as if we were their friends slowly learning astonishing facts about the triplets from separation to owning a restaurant called, what else, Triplets. Not only do we see the nuances of differences among the triplets, but we also get tantalizing looks into the machinery of adoption, not all happy to be sure.As adults, Robert Sheridan, David Kellman, and Eddy Galland are outgoing and articulate (only two are talking heads, while Eddy's part is archival footage). Good for director Wardle letting them tell the story without prompting, for effective docs mostly let the camera roll and the subject talk. This doc will grab you and not let you go-you'll hunger for more.As the background of the adoption and the testimony reveals startling information, our natural inclination is to contrast the three different social backgrounds to see the effects of nature vs. nurture. Indeed social scientists are here plying their trade, sometimes in unethical ways yet food for the thriller part of this engrossing film. Although the nature/nurture debate is never fully deconstructed, I was pleased with the taste of it, as most social scientists must be in such a delicious dramatic stew. I'm done writing for fear of spoiling one of the delights of this documentary: What comes next? Don't even Google because you can find the details there. Most desirable is to witness how artfully through excellent film you can find in reality that truth can be stranger than fiction. And definitely not fake. Three Identical Strangers is one of the year's best documentaries. It has it all but the definitive answer to the central mystery. Learn more by seeing it, not Googling it.

Stories about Twins (and other pairs of siblings) separated at birth aren't all that uncommon - but, triplets? Director Tim Wardle takes that rare occurrence and runs with it in the breathless and highly entertaining first section of his Documentary THREE IDENTICAL STRANGERS. Wardle also cleverly edits his footage (including the interviews) in order to preserve as many surprises about the secrets and lies to come later in the movie. Some might argue that Wardle's technique is a bit of cheat, but, for those who enter without knowing the full story it enhances the viewing, even if it does cause some issues later on. The story is told quite sequentially, and, again, that is in service of providing more drama as the Doc unfolds. Because the events go back to the 60s, many of the participants aren't around any longer to speak for themselves. Still, Wardle and his team managed to assemble a good cross-section of survivors to go on the record. Because the story was such a cause celebre in the early 80s (and in the NYC area to boot) we are also able to see a decent amount of historical footage of the triplets and their rise to fame including trips to the Today show, Donahue and a brief cameo in Susan Seidelman's DESPERATELY SEEKING SUSAN (supposedly at the behest of star Madonna). Some fairly minor dramatic re-enactments are also employed, and aren't distracting (Wardle also maintains the proper aspect ratio in much of the vintage footage - to his credit). As the true tale turns darker, a few issues with the filmmaking arrive. I won't delve into spoilers (I avoided them myself in order for the Doc to have maximum impact), but, the old Nurture vs. Nature debate becomes a key point of contention - as it does with all of these 'separated at birth' cases. Because of the way Wardle structures his editing, we mostly get the 'Nature' perspective until very late in the process. Further, a major cache of evidence is dropped in at the very last moment, and isn't sufficiently analyzed. It's understood that after five years in the making, Wardle, Raw, Neon and other production entities wanted to get their movie done and released, but one can't help but feel the editing was wrapped up in order to get a prized Sundance Film Festival spot. Wardle also includes a couple of curious montages repeating what we've seen earlier as if he had an eye on TV showings (CNN is set to show it). But, these problems pale compared to Wardle's casting a light on some highly unethical behavior that effected the triplets' lives. These relatively minor issues aside, THREE IDENTICAL STRANGERS again shows why there is a bit of Documentary boom going on. In a cinema dominated by Superhero and Animated flicks, there is a yearning among some adults for movies of substance and reality. STRANGERS is a true emotional roller-coaster.