User reviews

An authentic, powerful and brave film from a dedicated filmmaker committed to storytelling. The film is fresh in the use of multiple film mediums woven like a rag rug to share the history of the filmmaker's family. It takes a genuine integrity to collect, restore and record decades of visual history and then share your family's most intimate feelings with an audience. The film immediately absorbed me into the heart of and pulse of this family. Each family member trying to live in their expected roles in the eyes of society. Each member just wanting to love and be loved and not understanding the darkness that debilitates and controls the father's emotions.

This is the true story of the Brown Family and how they are forced to deal with the wake of their patriarch's stroke. He is a strong personality and use to being in-charge of himself and his family. It is told over the course of many years by use of archival and new found footage. You See Me is a refreshingly honest and deeply poignant tale. It is a heartfelt look at generational issues over time. It recounts the courage, tenacity and change that is required when a family member, who is typically the leader, becomes ill and must learn to be cared for by others. A tale of forgiveness and love with enough unexpected twists to keep you watching. I enjoyed it immensely.

Linda Brown's film is an intimate moving portrait of her family and especially her relationship with her father. She did a wonderful job of showing us the complexities of unraveling the background of an emotionally distant but caring and loyal man. I It was such a brave look at family secrets and the impact they had on her father and her entire family. It also is a portrait of a man trying to overcome the devastating effects of a stroke and the consequences of his stroke on his wife and the grown children. I know it will be helpful for families of stroke victims but is an important look at how a family history can effect its members in all areas. Linda's dedication to uncovering these secrets and her ability to get her family to open up in the interviews and daily moments of everyday life were raw and honest and very well done.

I'm really glad I saw this film.

There's a moment early on in Linda Brown's fascinating film, YOU SEE ME, of old footage being shown of her and her sister dressed up as husband and wife when they were kids. The two of them are performing for the camera, ultimately portraying their parents hug, dance, kiss, and fight. It's an incredibly engaging and deep moment because Brown has provided us the ability to look closer. On the surface, we see two siblings playing House. On another level, they may be expressing an emotional disconnect they've witnessed in their parents. How often do we hide emotions? Can we find the moments in our lives where we most represent ourselves? Is it more beneficial to ignore the times when you're least yourself, or more harmful?

Stanley Brown, Linda's father has had a stroke. It's left him with walking and talking as the challenge. Reminiscing through footage, Linda seeks to answer who her father really was, and what challenges he faced before the stroke. But as the film travels through more and more footage and photos of her parents' era, the mystery continues to grow farther from any catharsis. His entire speech to his friends and family during his 50th wedding anniversary is "I've worked hard all my life for one thing, for a higher education for my children. I didn't have it. That's about it."

The ongoing theme of Stanley is he shows as little emotion as needed. Yet he strikes you as someone you could easily talk to. Linda even expresses how she was more drawn to him growing up than her mother. It makes sense. He's lively and energetic, as long as the conversation didn't involve him. So what would it take to get a man like Stanley to say the words, "I love you"?

Natalie, Linda's mother, hints at her shy personality not necessarily helping her understand who her husband was underneath. Perhaps because of his upbringing he doesn't see a need for it. His mother had to raise him on her own, and it wasn't until he was sixteen he was told his real last name. You get the feeling that the heart-to-heart types of conversations, ones that came to a mutual understanding of love or fear, as needed as they are for someone like Stanley and everyone around him, were avoided, few, and far between. This film is on a hunt for what to make of those few moments.

Linda reminisces with her three siblings of times when their father would get physical with them and their mother. She even describes to her sister the heartbreaking memory of having to stand between her parents, to take the hit for her mother. "That's our role," is what they agreed upon that day, though simultaneously the Browns have no reason to think of Stanley as a cruel man.

It's clear Stanley's life and behavior have always peaked his family's interest. Linda shows footage of a previous documentary about her father, YOUR FAVORITE from 1984, in which she interviews Stanley directly, discussing how he was known to not show much affection for his children. The footage shows an uncomfortable closeup of a man so distant and so inaccessible he rarely looks up from the floor. The answer to his daughter's questions primarily is "I don't know." If YOUR FAVORITE was Linda's attempt to understanding her father, even just a little, YOU SEE ME shows just how tall and wide he's built a wall around himself, and that Linda must dig deeper than interviewing him to get in.

There's an uncanny similarity between Stanley Brown and my own grandfather. He didn't have strong parental figures, nor did he treat his four children with much affection, and he couldn't utter the words, "I love you," to his wife until his first child was ten years of age. Though, similar to Stanley, nothing in his world came close to his devotion for them. Sometimes it takes a lifetime to have a particular conversation. Affection in itself can be an entirely different language. And what seems like the final piece of an unsolved puzzle, YOU SEE ME's powerful bittersweet ending proves Stanley was never unwilling or incapable of affection. It's that he has to speak an unknown language over a wall to do so.

You See Me , by Linda Brown utilized family home movies to punctuate the

"in the moment" family dynamics of the family growing up that makes this film

so touching. The insight of these personal films as they are woven into the fabric of the narrative gives the viewer an eye opening look into the power of a home movie archive in personal story telling. It is a look back through the lens to the roles that the various family members played when the children were young and how these roles have evolved.

This is a wonderful film for all of us dealing with our elderly family members , and Health Care Organizations helping families through a medical transition with their loved ones.

This film was a thought provoking, emotional story of a real family. Going from laughter to tears throughout the film mimics my real life for the past year, as my mother declines. Watching your once strong, independent and very capable parent becoming frail, childlike and needy is deeply sad. However, seeing the before & after the stroke interactions of each family member with Stanley reminds me to cherish all the moments we have the privilege of sharing with each other, the good, the bad, the funny & sad. My favorite part of the film was the private video message from Stanley to Natalie, heartbreakingly real. Unfortunately late but how uncharacteristically sweet & real.

"You See Me" is a moving journey through the universal experience of caring for our loved ones as they face the challenge of health and mortality.

Linda Brown has crafted an excellent film that never loses our attention or our emotions. She has fearlessly invited us into her family and challenged us to remain and consider our own experience with parents who suffer the loss of health and power.

It is a sensitive and melancholy experience crafted with old visuals and new techniques that make the film engaging and artistically unique.

It is worth the journey.

Rob Kositchek

This documentary was extremely moving and involved many meaningful topics like family, health care, parent/child dynamics, and forgiveness. I laughed and cried a lot!! It was a roller coaster ride of emotions. Its use of home video is very poignant and effective. It looks at the complexities of that time many of us face, when we become the parent and our parent, in a way, becomes the child. The need to reconcile hurt feelings of the past when the person who had all the power suddenly becomes frail and vulnerable. Linda Brown seeks to understand and find proof of love in order to let go. Something I think most of us have struggled with at some point in our lives. Very grateful to have seen this film.

You See Me brings to light some of the darker and more painful sides of family in the hopes of healing old wounds. It takes the viewer through the critical months of an ailing father and explores the relationships between him and his wife, daughters, son, and parents. Illness, recovery, death, and life are all brought together in a beautiful way that the viewer can connect with. Hard truths are faced with in this unforgettable film. If able to, see this film when it comes in your area. I saw it at a screening and being able to question the director and hear commentary from the family of the movie is a wonderful way to experience it. If not, try to find it online or on DVD when it becomes available.

"You See Me" surprised me. I was invited to a screening and thought I was going to see a film about stroke victims. What I saw was a thoughtful and touching film about family. Not the kind you see on television but the real kind – the kind that has real ups and downs and no matter how much love may be present, on some level dysfunction is always just out of sight. It is obvious that this family loves one another but like all families, there are secrets. Through her own narration and interviews with family members, director Brown chooses to reveal very personal details of her childhood, her and the rest of the family's relationship with her father and how, in the end, no matter how a family may appear to the rest of the world, none are perfect and the love of a father doesn't always mean hugs. The film inspired me to think of my own childhood growing up wondering why my family wasn't like "Father Knows Best." As an adult, I know now nobody had a family like that. And through her film, Brown shows us how families are more complex that any television show could ever bring to the screen. And as they pull together in a time of crisis, she shows they can also evolve and grow by working through hurt and heartache to develop a deeper relationship with and new respect for someone they've known their entire lives.

You see me is an in-depth study of the inner workings of family, relationships, and the struggle for clarity and understanding in the midst of mental illness. It's a beautiful journey into the human condition which highlights our darkness as well as our light and how we cope with life's challenges with only the tools that we are given. We all can see ourselves in you see me and it is in the seeing, realizing and accepting that the healing can begin. I thoroughly enjoyed this film and recommend it as a must see. It is thoughtful, honest, beautiful and haunting at times. It will pull you in with it's mystery and leave you satisfied with seeing one journey completed and another just beginning. Thank you Linda.

You See Me is personal documentary filmmaking at its best, an intimate, unflinching family portrait, populated by complex and sympathetic characters (including the filmmaker herself). There has not been a feature narrative film this year more compelling or more richly nuanced.

At the center of the film is a man who has experienced a debilitating stroke, a man who has never been able to express his feelings for his family and for whom time is now running out. As we watch his wife and children struggle to care for him, You See Me peels back layer after layer of history and character to reveal the secrets of the heart within.

You See Me takes you on a journey of life, family, and vulnerability that exposes what so many families have experienced and yet has the courage to share it and expose it. The vulnerability and courage of the filmmaker to bring us into her world is raw, inspiring, and will make you see your own childhood in a new light, if you have the courage to face it , as she did. To many times in childhood we experience things that are wrong but we think they are right because that's all we know, however, when faced with the truth and understanding that things were not right, you have to decide how you will deal with it and if you will except it. This film not only took me on a journey, but also made me face my own demons with courage and honesty. A must see film!

So poignant, revealing and captivating. Linda has made a film that is very relatable yet it highlights the uniqueness of the individual experience. I went into the film thinking I knew the story only to find I knew little. So many of us are rising to similar challenges with our parents and Linda's story reinforces that this is a precious time to know them in new ways. There were many lines drawn in the big picture of this family; each member with their own part. I appreciated the interplay of old footage with new and the special relationship between Linda and her father. She clearly inherited his interest in chronicling life. A beautifully crafted narrative. I am looking forward to seeing more of Linda's work, past and future.

I watched this in one of my graduate classes,and it hit home for me and I was so easily moved. It gave great insight of the struggles and pain families go through when a family member is hurt or sick.Dealing with a grandmother with breast cancer receiving chemotherapy was hard on the whole family. We were invited to see how this family dealt with adversity and how it made this family stronger in the end. Their are families everywhere around the world facing the same problems. This was a great example of how diseases not only affect the person but the whole family. This documentary was excellent and everyone should see this !!

Has been touched throughout by this work that surrounds the family after the father suffered a stroke- it resonates well in many of us who can relate to the unspoken love we are tugged, or even surreptitiously trying to disentangle from, yet yearning the love despite the lack of trust in having one at all... This film is as honest as it can get.. that it is penetrating without being scathing nor exploitative.

Watch it before you grow too old to understand how our mind play on our memories by habitual perception. Be unburdened from a mundane world that is not necessarily catered to make our journey understandable. it is touching as a whole, not only healing for the makers but for a lot of older parents A feature documentary about embracing our past, confronting the unknown scars of our parents. A sincere dignified portrayal of one so close and dear, that moves us deeper to heal before we have to let go... Thank you - a small but big film.

A documentary ten years in the making, "You See Me" is made almost entirely of a family's home video footage, and its narrator is a daughter in the family. Unsuitable for the modern, stimulate-me-with-spectacle Hollywood audience, the filmmaker draws a portrait of her father that is deeply emotional without being sentimental. Her portrait shows the ways that a human being, born in a vacuum of love, cannot help but wound those that matter most to him, because he never learned to navigate a space of vulnerability. The early wounds of the filmmaker's father - desperate for the validation of his mother - closed quickly on him as scars, yet they managed to scar the family he was raising as well.

Remarkably, those scars are reopened when the filmmaker's father has a stroke, and - through the love of his wife and children - they are healed properly, beautifully, as can only happen when one is forgiven by those he injures. This documentary is a character study of the highest order, shedding light on the ways a single person can make all the difference in the world simply by being who he is.

By opening her home to us, Linda Brown has produced a psychological masterpiece that can only be understood through the complicated lens of family.

In "You See Me", producer/director Linda J. Brown first provides an inspiring account of her family coming to terms with the physical and emotional impact of caring for their father after he has a devastating stroke. As the film progresses, Brown weaves in accounts of her family history, and confronts previously unspoken truths about it that relate to the father's struggles with rehabilitation, and to each family member's reaction to his struggles. The result is a deeply personal and emotional account of a family not just enduring the challenges of a suffering parent, but also courageously confronting their past and making sense of it. The film is a must see in part for anyone who desires to openly and honestly examine their own life challenges, and how their family history plays a significant part in their response to those challenges.

Although dealing honesty with her family's history, Brown does not attempt to provide a clear reason for each difficult family theme that is represented. Family relationships can be dynamic and complicated, and the nature of them is even more pronounced when they exist within the context of physical illness. There are no easy answers as to why things are the way they are in a family, and this film honors that. The film does not allow the viewer to easily pass judgment on any one family member. In doing so, Brown gives the viewer the most powerful gift of all to everyone who struggles in family relationships - the gift of forgiveness.

This is what real cinema is all about; a documentary that is thought provoking; narrative and images that linger with you after the screening is over. A close-up look at family relationships and interactions; the single daughter who is dealing with parents at a distance, and the conversations that stir up emotions, yet are necessary. Yes it does get into that uncomfortable zone but it is therapeutic in that sense. The scene with the film-maker and her dog fishing in a small boat made me think of what clever technique she used to capture this moment. The medical information she discusses shows that progress happens when there is concerted effort to improve one's condition, despite all odds. This movie has a message of hope; people get along better when they discuss their differences openly. A message the movie presents to its audience with the backdrop of a family drama.