Twinsters is an eighty-nine minute documentary about Samantha Futerman, a Korean American woman, and Anais Bordier, a Korean French woman who discover that they may be twins because Futerman is an actor. The documentary captures their journey towards each other online and in real life. Futerman wrote and codirected the film with Ryan Miyamoto.
What distinguishes Twinsters from other participatory documentaries is how the filmmakers rely on screen casting as a narrative technique, which is predominantly used in horror films such as the Unfriended franchise and thrillers such as Searching. This movie definitely has a more realistic tone of what it is like to use and record your computer screen. It is mixed with pastel intertitles to keep the audience informed regarding the date with surrounding images as frames of the screen cast to depict the location of the user so we know whether Futerman or Bordier are communicating.
Twinsters is predominantly told from Futerman’s perspective and prioritizes conveying the emotions that she felt through montages of photographs of them at similar stages in their life before they met, confessionals and capturing interactions with friends. It is a documentary about how they begin to build a life together even though they are so far apart. It gives the film a human interest vibe or draws on the upbeat, positive reality television show genre whereas a film such as Three Identical Strangers also focuses on the systematic, larger implications of the personal story. This documentary began to feel repetitive and lose momentum as it unfolded as a result.
I tend to prefer documentaries in which the filmmakers are not close to the subject because it is harder for the filmmaker to judge how viewers will receive the documentary and what is missing. In Twinsters, the filmmaker is the subject. Also a lot of actors make documentaries with mixed results. Meet the Patels felt more like a vanity project than autobiographical. Queen Mimi was a perfect balance of the filmmaker being involved, but not self-absorbed or detracted from the subject. Twinsters felt more like a way to memorialize an experience, but also to make that experience less scary by seeing it through a lens and involving as many people as possible. While it is a great coping strategy, I also felt as if Futerman simultaneously put a lot of pressure on herself to be able to instantly verbalize mixed emotions and was occasionally uncomfortable under this self-imposed gaze then instinctually reverted to the sunny outlook instead of being comfortable with being uncomfortable.
I was frustrated that we got a lot of happy frolicking montages, which eventually felt superficial, instead of a deeper profile of them as individuals and a unit. For example, there is one scene in Twinsters in which one of the sisters casually mentioned, “Cool to hear what she [Bordier’s foster mom] remembers.” What was it that she remembered? No idea because that footage was not included in the film. I would have enjoyed learning more about their experiences in South Korea during the International Korean Adoptee Associations Conference. After awhile, I was frustrated that I got more of their emotional impression than their substantive stories, which were really engrossing. I enjoyed learning about their individual experiences and wanted more than the travel montages. Subjects in a documentary have a right to privacy and do not have to reveal everything, but I do not think that the filmmakers were aware that they were more moving around the story rather than telling it.
On a purely anthropological level, Twinsters was an interesting way to compare and contrast American with French life. Bordier’s friends socialize and dress in a method that can be classified as more mature or adult. They cook dinner and drink wine while socializing at home whereas Futterman’s friendships mostly unfold outdoors-hiking, restaurants or with a roommate. When Futterman cooks, she seems to use a microwave or toaster oven. The drinking is the focal point. Bordier readily expressed her anger issues whereas whenever Futterman started to be negative, she would explicitly rebuke herself because she is lucky. Bordier never explicitly mentions her transracial experience when discussing her negative feelings, but Futterman alludes to it when she analyzes Bordier’s experience. Bordier believes that she subconsciously remembered being torn from a sibling whereas Futterman could be unconsciously projecting something that she has not admitted to herself. Is Futterman in denial or is just an example of how American culture emphasizes the power of positive thinking and shies away from topics like race? It certainly explains why French movies have more texture and nuance than American dramas. It made sense that both had Asian friends because even though Futterman felt accepted, it is nice to have someone that you can relate to as a minority regardless of which country you live in. Futterman may not be able to explicitly say that she felt different because she does not want to inadvertently hurt the people that love her, but the proof is in the pudding. It is life.
Two different questions dominate Twinsters: are they actually twins and when and how often will they meet in real life? As someone with a lot of professional contextual experience with the administration of genetic marker tests, I was a bit impatient with drawing out this process or Bordier taking it after she ate. I prefer when people go to an office and have someone else take the genetic marker samples to get speedy and accurate results and establish a chain of custody if they want to legally formalize the biological relationship. Most people probably do not even know that a clinical experience is an option and that a biological relationship does not automatically equate to a legal relationship. #themoreyouknow
Twinsters does devote minimal time to Dr. Nancy Segal, who arranges the testing. The documentary shows Bordier and Futterman participating in some tests then the results of the test to show how psychologically different they are—nature or nurture. Because this section is so brief, and hearing the sisters talk about their personal experiences felt sufficient for the viewer to innately understand their different personalities, it felt as if it could be cut.
After Twinsters was released, Bordier and Futterman wrote a book called Separated @ Birth: A True Love Story of Twin Sisters Reunited, which I do not think that I will read, but I could change my mind. Even though I saw Memoirs of a Geisha and Across the Universe and watch Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, I do not recall seeing Futterman in them. I do not think that you need to know her work to be interested in her story. If you prefer documentaries that make you feel or are inspirational, I think that you will love it, and you can stream it online for a nominal fee, but as someone who prefers documentaries as a learning tool, it was a bit slight. Bordier draws, though she is not a professional illustrator, but I would love if Bordier made an animated sequel.
