Everyone Says I Look Just Like Her

I’ve watched “Everyone Says I Look Just Like Her” (Ryan Andrew Balas, 2010) during the 2011 Big Muddy Film Festival.

The film narrates the story of multiracial sisters who every year get together to remember their mother’s death anniversary. Mostly shot in one location, a house in the woods, the film explores the relationship of the sisters and their boyfriends.

The movie is story based, so there are not many camera moves, the editing style is unusual, specially in terms of sound, as frequently what you hear is not what you see, which makes the film a little confusing, as it is conversation heavy.

Some of the cast and crew were at the screening and there was a Q&A afterwards. The director Ryan Balas, who also acted in the movie, told us that in the summer of 2009 he rented a house in Northern Michigan to use as location, and everybody stayed there for 10 days, shooting all the time. That resulted in a great deal of improvisation and 36 hours of raw footage.

One thing that Balas mentioned and that surprised me was that Afro-American sister was adopted, something that is not clear at all in the movie.

In general, I enjoyed the movie, but I would not say that it is original in anyway, as it seems to follow the same filming style of other new directors, such as SIUC alumni Joe Swanberg, who actually has a part in Balas’s film. What I like about their idea is that they are truly independent filmmakers, who use very little money to do what they love.

http://www.everyonesaysilookjustlikeher.blogspot.com/