I’ve had a busy schedule lately, but a friend of mine told me to check out the new documentary “Three Identical Strangers,” and it’s both informative and surprising. It offers three emotions: Joy, Anger, and Sadness, and balances them with patience and organization.

The movie first introduces us to Robert Shafran, who arrives at college in 1980, with students thinking he’s Eddy. He tells them he’s not Eddy. He doesn’t even know who he is. And by a strange coincidence, they were both born on July 12, 1961, and were adopted from Louise Wise Services.

Ergo, they’re twins!

When they finally meet, and it makes the papers, people start to think David Kellman is in it. And when David checks out the article, he finds out they’re triplets.

They all have the same face, the same hair, the same characteristics, and the same taste in activities and women.

And when they all meet, they’re more than happy to see each other. But their adoptive parents are infuriated that Louise Wise Services had to separate the triplets, because they claim it would be difficult for parents to adopt three kids.

The boys could care less since it’s not their job to worry about that, but they learn about their mother who had to give them up. And even worse, they were psychically experimented on-studied, filmed, and questioned. And it’s not just triplets, but twins as well. Who do they think they are?!

I’d like to elaborate on on the Joy, Anger, and Sadness emotions.”Three Identical Strangers” starts off happy (maybe a bit much at times) with the triplets meeting for the first time, and ends up informing us about the true dark side to it. Director Tim Wardle allows us to get angry at how people would wrongfully experiment on triplets and twins, and makes us smile at the triplets’ brotherhood. But more importantly, this is serious.

And it’s also sad in the way it shows us that this kind of experiment could result in depression. Eddy has unfortunately suffered from it, and therefore, in 1995, he committed suicide. Studying twins or triplets is wrong in terms of human nature, and neither of the remaining triplets will take it anymore.

I’m no twin or triplet sibling, but I’d like to share something with you. We are people; not lab rats, and we don’t deserved to be treated that way. That’s what the movie wants to convey, and it’s aggravating. No, it’s infuriating.

“Three Identical Strangers” is another fresh documentary out this summer, along with “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?.” I don’t go to much documentaries, however, if they have interesting topics, I’d like to see for myself. And with these two docs, I’m glad I did.

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Categories: Documentary