movie review all my puny sorrows

Movie Reviews

Tv/streaming, collections, great movies, chaz's journal, contributors, all my puny sorrows.

Now streaming on:

"She wanted to die and I wanted her to live and we were enemies who loved each other." This is how narrator Yolandi ("Yoli") describes the conflict with her sister Elfrieda (" Elf "), in Miriam Toews' celebrated novel All My Puny Sorrows , loosely based on events in Toews' own life. Elf is a concert pianist who has attempted suicide multiple times. Yoli, a novelist, drops everything to tend to her sister in the psych ward, trying to convince Elf that life, painful as it is, is worth living. But Elf has one eye on oblivion at all times. To her, the siren call of death is louder than any concerto.

Toews' book is a painful one, but it's also funny, sharp-witted, giving a rich texture to this very specific Mennonite family and the ways they cope, endure, hold each other up (or not). Director Michael McGowan has adapted Toews' book for the screen, and two powerful actresses— Sarah Gadon and Alison Pill —play the sisters. While the adaptation is, in many ways, quite skilled, the pace of "All My Puny Sorrows" is so stately, and the overall tone so reserved, that it results in an emotionally muted film. Everything seems to be happening underwater, and this runs counter to the overall subject of generational trauma, suicide, and mortality.

Elf and Yoli grew up in a close-knit and very controlling Mennonite community in Winnipeg. Their father Jake ( Donal Logue ), butted heads with the elders when he decided to let Elf study music in college. It caused a lot of friction in the traditional hierarchy. Jake ran up against similar resistance in his attempts to create a small library. Jake commits suicide soon after, and the family has lived in the aftershock of that event ever since. The girls' mother, Lottie ( Mare Winningham ), is a strong and solid woman, who carried on alone, but is devastated at the heavy load her daughters have had to carry. She says to Yoli, point-blank, "You carry a lot of sadness, and for that I am sorry."

When Elf ends up in the hospital after her second suicide attempt, Yoli flies in from Toronto to "circle the wagons." Elf wants Yoli to help her get to Switzerland where there is a clinic known for assisted suicide. The banter between the sisters is sharp and sarcastic. The two of them are both well-read, and pepper their conversations with quotes from D.H. Lawrence or Paul Valéry. Elf's suicide note quotes Philip Larkin's haunting and eerie poem Days . The title of the book (and film) comes from Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poem To a Friend, written for Charles Lamb, whose sister had fallen ill. Coleridge writes with empathy:

"I, too, a sister had, an only sister — She loved me dearly, and I doted on her; To her I pour'd forth all my puny sorrows."

There are a lot of old and complicated family dynamics at play here: Elf was the perfect sister, Yoli the rebel who got pregnant at seventeen, etc. Elf's husband Nic ( Aly Mawji ) seems supportive, but also fairly useless, and Elf's psychiatrist is inclined to release her from the hospital. Yoli begs him not to.

The film opens with Donal Logue, standing on railroad tracks, staring at a train approaching, awaiting his own death, a death he chose. It's an image McGowan comes back to again and again. "All My Puny Sorrows" is woven through with collage-like fragments of this moment and others, showing the past, the two sisters as children, the glimpses of their strong bond, the toys they played with, the woods they wandered through, their smiles. These collages create an associative and subjective mood, placing us in Yoli's head, where memories intrude upon the present. Yoli's voiceover is used so inconsistently it never solidifies into an actual choice. The film is clearly told from her point of view, but the voiceover adds next to no insight, and for long sections it falls away altogether.

Compare to a film like "'night, Mother," which has a similar theme: a mother tries to stop her daughter from killing herself. In that film, Anne Bancroft desperate pleading and Sissy Spacek's practical certainty makes for an extremely unnerving watch. You hope the mother will succeed in convincing the daughter to stick around. But the daughter seems so determined, it feels like it's too late. She's already gone, really, it's just that she needs to tie up some loose ends. Playing out in real time, "'night, Mother" is devastating. "All My Puny Sorrows" has all the elements to pack a devastating punch, but there's no real sense of urgency. It's like people are just marking time, like the end has already been determined, it's just a matter of resigning oneself to the inevitable.

The three actresses are wonderful—particularly Pill, who inhabits Yoli's ragged insecurities with comfort and familiarity (bringing some welcome humor to this mostly glum affair). Yoli feels very real. The scenes with her daughter Nora ( Amybeth McNulty ) are some of the best in the film, quiet and insightful. Gadon is a wonderful actress, although here she mostly just lies in a hospital bed, staring off vaguely and sadly into the distance. There are moments when the heat is turned up underneath the characters—when Yoli tells Elf how much she will miss her, for example—but it's never enough. The temperature remains lukewarm.

Now available on digital platforms.

Sheila O'Malley

Sheila O'Malley received a BFA in Theatre from the University of Rhode Island and a Master's in Acting from the Actors Studio MFA Program. Read her answers to our Movie Love Questionnaire here .

Now playing

In the Land of Saints and Sinners

Brian tallerico.

Do Not Expect Too Much from the End of the World

Simon Abrams

Little Wing

Marya e. gates.

Drive-Away Dolls

Tomris laffly.

Film Credits

All My Puny Sorrows (2022)

103 minutes

Alison Pill as Yolandi Von Riesen

Sarah Gadon as Elfrieda Von Riesen

Amybeth McNulty as Nora Von Riesen

Mare Winningham as Lottie Von Riesen

Donal Logue as Jake Von Riesen

Mimi Kuzyk as Tina Von Riesen

Michael Musi as Finbar

Aly Mawji as Nic

Michael McGowan

Writer (novel)

Miriam Toews

Cinematographer

Daniel Grant
Michelle Szemberg
Orlee Buium

Latest blog posts

A Poet of an Actor: Louis Gossett, Jr. (1936-2024)

Why I Love Ebertfest: A Movie Lover's Dream

Adam Wingard Focuses on the Monsters

Colin Farrell Shines In Apple TV+’s Refined and Genre-Bending Sugar

Log in or sign up for Rotten Tomatoes

Trouble logging in?

By continuing, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from the Fandango Media Brands .

By creating an account, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes and to receive email from the Fandango Media Brands .

By creating an account, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes.

Email not verified

Let's keep in touch.

Sign up for the Rotten Tomatoes newsletter to get weekly updates on:

Upcoming Movies and TV shows
Trivia & Rotten Tomatoes Podcast
Media News + More

By clicking "Sign Me Up," you are agreeing to receive occasional emails and communications from Fandango Media (Fandango, Vudu, and Rotten Tomatoes) and consenting to Fandango's Privacy Policy and Terms and Policies . Please allow 10 business days for your account to reflect your preferences.

OK, got it!

Movies / TV

No results found.

What's the Tomatometer®?
Login/signup

Movies in theaters

Opening this week
Top box office
Coming soon to theaters
Certified fresh movies

Movies at home

Netflix streaming
Prime Video
Most popular streaming movies
What to Watch New

Certified fresh picks

Love Lies Bleeding Link to Love Lies Bleeding
Problemista Link to Problemista
Late Night with the Devil Link to Late Night with the Devil

New TV Tonight

We Were the Lucky Ones: Season 1
Jerrod Carmichael: Reality Show: Season 1
Steve! (Martin) A Documentary in 2 Pieces: Season 1
A Gentleman in Moscow: Season 1
Renegade Nell: Season 1
American Rust: Season 2
The Baxters: Season 1
grown-ish: Season 6

All My Puny Sorrows Reviews

It's better suited to the page than screen as the pain gets passed off in purple prose, which in turn undermines the emotional core.

Full Review | Original Score: C | Dec 10, 2022

If you are in the right mindset for a serious drama, All My Puny Sorrows is a delicate, beautiful story, a worthy screen adaptation of a book that has challenged and comforted many readers.

Full Review | Oct 3, 2022

The performances are strong all around, especially from Alison Pill as a woman painfully and poignantly trying to convince her sister that life is worthwhile.

Full Review | Jun 13, 2022

Despite excellent performances from Pill and Gadon, working in tandem with McGowan’s efforts to conjure the film's effective atmosphere of limbo, All My Puny Sorrows ultimately sags under the weight of its unwieldy script.

Full Review | Jun 7, 2022

The acting is first rate by Pill and Winningham but the overall angst of the story drags it down.

Full Review | Original Score: 5/10 | May 25, 2022

It's very heavy... But if you stick with it, it's worth it.

Full Review | May 10, 2022

Alison Pill just tears it up in this. She is funny, raw, and complex.

Where many films would use this as a springboard for a tedious moral treatise on a hot-button issue, “All My Puny Sorrows” keeps the focus commendably and non-judgmentally personal.

Full Review | May 6, 2022

In the end, the film not only entertains but illuminates the human condition. It’s an honest and moving work, full of artistry and bravery.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | May 6, 2022

The story, dealing with the sensitive subjects of suicide and depression, is routinely thoughtfully handled and grounded with a pair of emotionally riveting performances from Alison Pill and Sarah Gadon

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | May 5, 2022

The small Canadian indie will make you laugh and cry with its intelligent story of a family now mostly consisting of women trying to avoid one more tragedy. Sisters (Sarah Gadon and the exceptional Alison Pill) are at the center of it all. (mini review)

Full Review | Original Score: 4.5.5 | May 4, 2022

The ensemble builds believable chemistry as intimate family members, and when their characters deliver their arguments for life or death, the stakes feel appropriately high.

Full Review | May 3, 2022

While the adaptation is, in many ways, quite skilled, the pace of All My Puny Sorrows is so stately, and the overall tone so reserved, that it results in an emotionally muted film.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | May 3, 2022

What's remarkable about writer-director Michael McGowan's adaptation of Miriam Toews' bestselling novel is that it's often warm and funny, even when dealing with extremely heavy subject matter.

Full Review | May 2, 2022

It never quite lapses into glib or draining, the way most screen treatments of this subject and this debate do.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Apr 30, 2022

The beating heart of Puny Sorrows comes down to the central performances.

Full Review | Apr 22, 2022

All My Puny Sorrows is a mature and beautiful story, the union of a celebrated author with a filmmaker in his creative prime.

Full Review | Original Score: 5/5 | Apr 15, 2022

A transcendent experience that forgives and moves forward.

Full Review | Apr 15, 2022

All My Puny Sorrows is an emotional movie that embraces the totality of the situation, the exasperation, sorrow and even occasional humor.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Apr 14, 2022

I love this movie like a person. It pierced my heart the way certain paintings or pieces of music do. The way standing at the foot of a mountain does.

Full Review | Apr 13, 2022

an image, when javascript is unavailable

‘All My Puny Sorrows’ Review: Two Sisters Debate the Merits of Living in a Sincere But Stilted Grief Drama

Miriam Toews' emotionally raw bestseller translates awkwardly to the screen, despite heartfelt performances from Alison Pill, Sarah Gadon and Mare Winningham.

By Guy Lodge

Film Critic

‘Mothers’ Instinct’ Review: Anne Hathaway and Jessica Chastain Primly Do Battle in a Loopy Suburban Psychodrama 3 days ago
‘Who by Fire’ Review: A Canadian Cabin-in-the-Woods Getaway Goes Strangely and Rivetingly Awry 5 days ago
‘Close to You’ Review: Elliot Page Makes an Affecting Big-Screen Return in a Fragile Homecoming Drama 1 week ago

Miriam Toews’ 2014 novel “ All My Puny Sorrows ” thrives on the kind of fraught tonal whiplash that comes with the most intimate of relationships to one’s subject. Inspired by the suicide of the author’s sister, the book is a veiled grief memoir that veers wildly between plangent, poetic despair, plainspoken journaling and blunt, cutting humor — a spectrum mirroring the variable stages of grief itself. We can risk brutality and bad taste in the name of honesty when telling our own stories; Michael McGowan ’s adaptation of “All My Puny Sorrows,” on the other hand, approaches its with a respectful timidity that honors Toews’ words, but never quite animates them.

On screen, then, “All My Puny Sorrows” is affecting, as any reasonably faithful adaptation of the novel could hardly fail to be. As a portrait of sisterly trust, obligation and estrangement, and the difficulty of carrying familial dependencies into adulthood and beyond, the film is measured and thoughtful, lifted by performances of characteristic sensitivity by Alison Pill and Sarah Gadon — as two women who, depending on the day, either understand each other all too well or don’t know each other at all.

But it’s also weighed down by a heavy dourness that doesn’t mark the novel. Burdened by its duty of care to a fragile text, the film preserves too much of it wholesale, its writing taking on a literary artificiality that doesn’t quite match Toews’ elegant candor, even when the phrasing remains the same. This is a film where characters speak in articulate, cannily observed truths that nonetheless don’t feel entirely true to life: “One of us had to show some empathy to Dad and his acres of existential sadness,” says one sister, in supposed anger, during an argument. Elsewhere, she complains about someone having a “a low-grade understanding of despair”: The film’s understanding of such is nothing if not high-grade at all times, but you do occasionally wish for cruder, messier interjections.

Directing his first feature since 2012’s well-regarded older-age romance “Still Mine,” McGowan opens on a typically restrained scene of horror, as middle-aged, anxious-faced Jake (Donal Logue) quietly bides his time by a rural rail crossing, before calmly stepping in front of an oncoming train. Shifting forward in time, we gather that he was the father of struggling author Yolandi (Pill) and celebrated concert pianist Elfriede (Gadon), and that his fatal unhappiness has proven hereditary. We meet Toronto-based Yolandi in the throes of creative frustration and the immediate aftermath of a failed marriage; Elfriede, meanwhile, has recently attempted suicide, despite the professional acclaim and romantic stability that eludes her sister.

In response to this crisis, Yolandi returns to the family nest in Winnipeg, where she attempts to talk the hospitalized Elfriede back into living, while strengthening bonds with their much-wounded mother Lottie — wonderfully played by Mare Winningham as a woman jaded by misfortune, balancing bright good humor against the darker pull of fatalism. The human stakes couldn’t be higher even as the drama simmers at a low, consistent temperature: Unyielding if not unsympathetic to her sister’s plea for a renewed lease on life, Elfriede instead begs her to accompany her to an assisted dying clinic in Switzerland. Where many films would use this as a springboard for a tedious moral treatise on a hot-button issue, “All My Puny Sorrows” keeps the focus commendably and non-judgmentally personal.

If only it felt a little more vividly inhabited. Guiding proceedings with an unnecessary, overtly novelistic voiceover that the film abandons for long stretches at a time, Yolandi feels less like a flawed, completely incomplete human being than one of her own unfinished characters, delivering passages of emotively worded feeling while hiding her heart from the viewer. Hot, archly lacerating exchanges with her own teenage daughter Nora (Amybeth McNulty, excellent) are welcome but too infrequent; wordless flashbacks to the girls’ repressive, evidently formative Mennonite upbringing are altogether too vague, skimping on telling sociocultural detail.

“All My Puny Sorrows” fills in its characters’ blanks with poetic verbiage, some its own and some some repurposed: Among a surfeit of literary quotations and namedrops, the title is lifted from a Coleridge poem, and beautifully incorporated it is too. Yet the sporadic, essential ugliness of its source material is little in evidence. Toews’ more caustic, tortured wit hasn’t made it to an adaptation that, down to its muted gray-on-gray lensing and pretty, maudlin piano-based score, prizes a soft touch over a gut-punch.

“All My Puny Sorrows” is available on demand and digital now.

Reviewed online, May 5, 2022. In Toronto, Santa Barbara film festivals. Running time: 103 MIN.

Production: (Canada) A Momentum Pictures release and presentation, in association with Crave, CBC Films of a Mulmur Feed Co. production, in association with Sugar Shack Prods., Carousel Pictures. Producers: Michael McGowan, Patrice Theroux, Tyler Levine. Executive producers: Hussain Amarshi, Peter Gibson, Naveen Prasad.
Crew: Director, screenplay: Michael McGowan, based on the novel by Miriam Toews. Camera: Daniel Grant. Editors: Michelle Szemberg, Orlee Buium. Music: Jonathan Goldsmith.
With: Alison Pill, Sarah Gadon, Mare Winningham, Amybeth McNulty, Mini Kuzyk, Donal Logue, Aly Mawji, Michael Musi, Martin Roach, Dov Tiefenbach, Rick Roberts, Elizabeth Saunders, Boyd Banks.

More From Our Brands

Sarah paulson says she and pedro pascal disagree on who beyoncé blew a kiss to, joseph eichler’s personal silicon valley home is up for grabs at $6.4 million, a-rod, lore say they’re ‘going to be’ the next timberwolves owners, the best loofahs and body scrubbers, according to dermatologists, tvline items: chicago fire’s new paramedic, invasion additions and more, verify it's you, please log in.

All My Puny Sorrows Explores Grief & Depression With Grace & Humor

Literary adaptation All My Puny Sorrows often proves warm and funny, even when dealing with heavy subject matter in this meaningful film.

The premise of All My Puny Sorrows is so bleak that the movie could easily be a depressing slog to watch. What's remarkable about writer-director Michael McGowan's adaptation of Miriam Toews' bestselling novel is that it's often warm and funny, even when dealing with extremely heavy subject matter. McGowan and star Alison Pill give All My Puny Sorrows a sharp, self-aware sense of humor that goes a long way toward mitigating its darkness. However, that doesn't mean that the movie ignores the seriousness of Toews' story, which was inspired by events from her own life.

Pill plays Yolandi "Yoli" Von Riesen, a mildly successful fiction writer who is struggling through a divorce and the process of writing her latest book. She and her sister Elfrieda (Sarah Gadon) grew up in a cloistered Mennonite community in Canada, but they left that life behind long ago. Elfrieda (who goes by Elf) is now a renowned concert pianist who tours the world. Their father, Jake (Donal Logue), died by suicide when they were children, stepping in front of a train to end his life. Even before then, the free-spirited, intellectually curious family was at odds with the community's religious leadership. While Yoli and Elf's mother, Lottie (Mare Winningham), still lives in the same town, she's also estranged from the church.

RELATED: Star Trek: Picard Gives the Borg the Ultimate Sleeper Agent

The sisters are clearly scarred by the way the church elders treated them and also by the gruesome end to their father's life. Elf has inherited Jake's propensity for depression, and she's already attempted suicide once before the movie begins. The sisters have a natural sarcastic rapport that doesn't shy away from their shared trauma, but Yoli is still shaken when she gets a call that Elf has attempted suicide again and is now in the hospital. Yoli returns to her hometown, leaving behind her teenage daughter Nora (Amybeth McNulty) and the divorce papers she still can't bring herself to sign.

As painful as it is for Yoli to see her sister in such despair, it's also an easy distraction from the problems in her own life. At first, this seems like just another bump in the road for Elf, who has a strong support system in her sister, mother, and husband and is getting the care she needs in the hospital. When Yoli arrives, she jokes with Elf about her low-priority placement in Elf's suicide note, and the morbid humor is a refreshing counterpoint to the somber circumstances. McGowan balances those tones throughout All My Puny Sorrows , although the solemnity eventually overtakes the humor as the family's situation gets worse.

Despite her seeming good humor and defiant attitude -- she scares off a Mennonite missionary by casually disrobing in front of him -- Elf is still fixated on dying. She tries to convince Yoli to take her to an assisted suicide clinic in Switzerland, and she won't listen to any arguments, either logical or emotional, for why she should take her medication and focus on staying alive. Pill and Gadon have fantastic chemistry as the sisters who've bonded over so many tragic events, but All My Puny Sorrows remains squarely focused on Yoli, whose own suffering is constantly overshadowed by her sister's. Yoli resents that Elf seems to have everything -- wealth, success, adoring fans, a loving husband -- and yet appreciates none of it. That, of course, is the nature of depression , which Yoli also knows, even if she can't truly grasp how her sister feels.

RELATED: Marvelous and the Black Hole Conjures a Fresh, Dreamlike Coming-of-Age Tale

Befitting its literary origins, All My Puny Sorrows is full of florid language, both in the dialogue and in Pill's voiceover narration as Yoli, but it never sounds pretentious or overwritten. Yoli is a writer, so it makes sense that she'd think of her life in literary terms , using horrific events to shape a narrative just as Toews herself did in writing the book the movie is based on. All My Puny Sorrows features plenty of literary allusions, starting with its titular quote from a Samuel Taylor Coleridge poem, and McGowan conveys just how essential literature and art are in the lives of these characters.

There are times when it feels like All My Puny Sorrows is piling on the not-so-puny sorrows. However, every time the movie threatens to become heavy-handed, it steps back with a joke or a wry observation. Both Yoli and McGowan understand that death and sadness are essential parts of life and always exist alongside joy and humor and love.

Through all of these horrible experiences, Yoli comes to better appreciate both her sister and her own life, to embrace her mistakes for where they have taken her and what they've taught her. Pill's brilliant performance captures all of this messy, difficult emotional growth, along with simple everyday frustrations that can sometimes seem insurmountable. Many of Yoli's sorrows may be puny, but they're all deeply meaningful, both to her and to the audience.

All My Puny Sorrows is available Tuesday, May 3 on VOD.

Exquisite adaptation of Miriam Toews’ All My Puny Sorrows will pierce your heart

This article was published more than 1 year ago. Some information may no longer be current.

Sarah Gadon and Alison Pill in a scene from All My Puny Sorrows. Courtesy of AMPS Productions Inc. / Mongrel Media

Plan your screen time with the weekly What to Watch newsletter. Sign up today.

All My Puny Sorrows

Written and directed by Michael McGowan, based on the novel by Miriam Toews

Starring Alison Pill, Sarah Gadon and Mare Winningham

Classification 14A; 103 minutes

Opens April 15 in Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal and Winnipeg, expanding to other cities April 22

Critic’s Pick

I love this movie like a person. It pierced my heart the way certain paintings or pieces of music do. The way standing at the foot of a mountain does. The first time I saw it, I had to stay in my cinema seat for five minutes after it ended, to finish crying. The second time, I vowed to watch it more analytically, but ended up crying all over again.

The story, briefly: Lottie (Mare Winningham) and her daughters Elfrieda (Sarah Gadon), known as Elf, a world-renowned concert pianist, and Yoli (Alison Pill), a recently divorced mother and burgeoning novelist, are living with the after-effects of the suicide of their husband and father 12 years ago. Now, as Elf’s own depression closes in, Yoli has to fight to give her reasons to live.

Mare Winningham in a scene from All My Puny Sorrows. Courtesy of AMPS Productions Inc. / Mongrel Media

That sounds bleak, but mysteriously, it’s the opposite. What the screenwriter and director Michael McGowan pulls off here is a miracle of tone – the same tone that Miriam Toews established in her source novel, whose title comes from a Coleridge poem: “I too a Sister had…To her I pour’d forth all my puny sorrows.” It’s that juxtaposition of puny and sorrow, that heightened awareness of the bitter-sweetness of being human, that slays me. Our individual sorrows, when we are suffering them, are everything. But in the collective scheme of things, they are nothing. We go on. Life is funny because it is so sad, beautiful because it is ephemeral. Getting that tone right is how a story about grief turns into one of the most life-affirming things you’ll ever see.

It’s hard enough to do that in a novel. On film it only works if everyone is making exactly the same movie – and I mean everyone, from the production designer who knows what someone’s bookshelves should look like to the sound engineer who finds just the right (menacing, innocent) chug of a train.

And of course, the actors. Here’s another miracle that McGowan and his casting director, Heidi Levitt, manifested: Yoli, Elf and Lottie each need something, and Pill, Gadon and Winningham each has precisely that thing to give. Winningham’s Lottie radiates an acceptance of grief that is stoic but warm; she’s plain-spoken to the point of being blunt but her emotional bravery is boundless; and she just loves people, she can’t help it. Gadon’s Elf has to be as otherworldly as her name suggests – fully believable as a part of this family, but also apart from it, as if Lottie somehow gave birth to a mermaid. In other roles, Gadon’s preternatural beauty and intelligence can make her seem too separate; here they work exquisitely, the furrow in her brow like a thumbprint of pain.

Screenwriter and director Michael McGowan turns a story about grief into one of the most life-affirming things you’ll ever see. Courtesy of AMPS Productions Inc. / Mongrel Media

As for Pill – she’s sensational, one of those rare actors whose skin is near-transparent. You can practically feel the snow on her cheek. Watch her eyes darken when Yoli realizes what Elf means by, “They have clinics in Switzerland.” Watch her face in one perfect funny moment, when some dude from her past equates writing with cleaning septic tanks – in the first nanosecond she’s amused, grossed out and slightly offended; in the next, she’s thinking it over, and she agrees.

McGowan wisely sets the spine of his film – a series of conversations between Yoli and Elf, where their jokey, sisterly manner belies how desperately urgent both their pleas are – and then builds it out, layering in just the information we need at the moment we need it. A few of the flashbacks of the sisters as young girls feel inordinately sweet, but that’s a small flaw compared to how thoughtful this film is about life after grief; how many lines and moments are instant classics; and what a feat it is that the characters and relationships are so fully realized that a reference to Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn is amusing, wise and heartrending all at once.

Yoli marvels at the kind of people “who have a great capacity for things,” but we see that she’s one of them. The mess of life is its point. Hope is excruciating, and also necessary. As Yoli says, quoting Elf, who’s quoting D.H. Lawrence, “We’ve got to live, no matter how many skies have fallen.”

Special to The Globe and Mail

Plan your screen time with the weekly What to Watch newsletter, with film, TV and streaming reviews and more. Sign up today .

Report an editorial error

Report a technical issue

Editorial code of conduct

Follow related authors and topics

Film Follow You must be logged in to follow. Log In Create free account
Pop culture Follow You must be logged in to follow. Log In Create free account
Streaming Follow You must be logged in to follow. Log In Create free account

Authors and topics you follow will be added to your personal news feed in Following .

Interact with The Globe

The A.V. Club
The Takeout
The Inventory

All My Puny Sorrows

Where to Watch

Alison Pill (Yoli) Sarah Gadon (Elf) Mare Winningham (Lottie) Donal Logue (Jake) Amybeth McNulty (Nora) Mimi Kuzyk (Tina) Aly Mawji (Nic) Marin Almasi (Young Yoli) Gabrielle Jennings (Young Elf) Michael Musi (Finbar) Martin Roach (Psychiatrist Johns) Dov Tiefenbach (Jason) Rick Roberts (Elder) Elizabeth Saunders (Marta) Boyd Banks (Pastor) Racine Bebamikawe (Nurse) Josh Bainbridge (Irate Man) Morgan Bedard (Cop)

Michael McGowan

Based on the 2014 international best-selling novel by Miriam Toews, All My Puny Sorrows is the poignant story of two sisters, one a concert pianist obsessed with ending her life, and the other a writer who, in wrestling with this decision, makes profound discoveries about her herself.

Recommendations

All My Puny Sorrows Review: A Near-Perfect Exploration of Depression

Starring Alison Pill and Sarah Gadon, All My Puny Sorrows is arguably one of the most impressive movies about depression in decades.

Warning: This Article Addresses the Topic of Suicide and Self-Harm

The so-called ‘psychotically depressed’ person who tries to kill herself doesn’t do so out of quote ‘hopelessness’ or any abstract conviction that life’s assets and debits do not square. And surely not because death seems suddenly appealing. The person in whom its invisible agony reaches a certain unendurable level will kill herself the same way a trapped person will eventually jump from the window of a burning high-rise.

This passage from David Foster Wallace's epic novel Infinite Jest begins to describe suicidal ideation in a way most people with depression innately understand. To those without depression, the suicidal act (or the weeks in bed, with the afterthought of bathing too painful to even surmise) and the aforementioned quote make little sense. All My Puny Sorrows , the new Canadian film from writer/director Michael McGowan, bridges the gap between those who understand suicide and those who don't; it's simply one of the best movies about depression in decades.

Puny Sorrows is an Understatement

All My Puny Sorrows , based on the somewhat semi-autobiographical novel from Miriam Toews, focuses on a family who understands depression and suicide. The Von Riesens have lost many of their members in this way, their family tree having been cut down by misery, with only a few surviving, beautiful branches left lying in the leaves. These are Lottie (Mare Winningham) and her daughters, Elf ( Sarah Gadon ) and Yoli ( Alison Pill ), along with Aunt Tina (Mimi Kuzyk). Patriarch Jake (Donal Logue) died by suicide when the girls were relatively young, and the family has been coping ever since.

Related: These Movies Perfectly Capture What It's Like To Have Anxiety

All My Puny Sorrows drops the audience into the aftermath of decades of despair, with author Yoli dealing with a divorce and Elf a successful but despairing pianist. Pill and Gadon are so excellent here that their chemistry is automatically palpable, and viewers don't need any time to acclimate. Part of this is because the two actors actually grew up alongside each other, attending school together at one point, appearing together in a film, and knowing each other since their youth; this real-life longevity shouldn't distract from the fact that the actors give top performances which invite viewers immediately into their lives and relationship.

Before long, Elf attempts suicide, something which she's done before. This, along with many aspects of the film, begins an interesting exploration of the old 'nature versus nurture' debate; how much of Elf's will-toward-death is chosen, and how much is this simply the residual genetics from a lineage of loss?

Nonetheless, Yoli returns home to be with her mother and sister, reconnecting with the past she left behind along the way. Tragedy haunts the family like a specter, and their attitudes towards life and their respective personalities have shifted as a result. As such, the majority of the film has less to do with the plot than it has to do with these unique characters and their powerful interactions with one another; they're an intellectual family, constantly referencing poets, musicians, and literature as if to distract from what's tangibly present.

Anyone who has dealt with depression, personally or amongst others, will find remarkable resonance in a lot of this dialogue, which is not just authentically representative of depression and suicidal ideation, but also incredibly smart and frequently comedic , as sarcasm remains one of the more fortified armors against pain for the depressed person.

The Brilliant Interactions Between Alison Pill and Sarah Gadon

All of the acting is excellent, including a perfect Mare Winningham, who continues to prove why she's a seven-time Emmy Award nominee and Golden Globe and Oscar-nominated actress. Logue is fantastic in a small part, and AmyBeth McNulty is quietly wonderful as Yoli's daughter Nora. Pill and Gadon are at the top of their games here and their instinctual chemistry goes a long way, but it's the sensitive script from McGowan (and the original words from Toews) which truly constructs a dynamic relationship.

The interactions between Pill and Gadon are brilliant at not only exploring their individual characters but the nature of depression and suicide itself. The hospital conversations between Elf and Yoli are arguably the most powerful and fascinating parts of the film; in a sense, each of these scenes is a duel, with words and ideas as weapons, Yoli on the side of life, and Elf on the side of not-life.

Related: Exclusive: Alison Pill Won't Be in Star Trek Picard: Season 3

The term 'not-life' is used here rather than 'death,' because the film doesn't glorify death or suicide in any way; Elf, like many suicidal people, doesn't 'want' to die, she merely doesn't 'want' to live. Life is correlated with great suffering and constant pain to the depressed person, and death is seen as a way out, and this is something that really only the suicidal person understands. In Infinite Jest , Wallace goes on to say:

Make no mistake about people who leap from burning windows. Their terror of falling from a great height is still just as great as it would be for you or me standing speculatively at the same window just checking out the view; i.e. the fear of falling remains a constant. The variable here is the other terror, the fire’s flames: when the flames get close enough, falling to death becomes the slightly less terrible of two terrors. It’s not desiring the fall; it’s terror of the flames. And yet nobody down on the sidewalk, looking up and yelling ‘Don’t!’ and ‘Hang on!’, can understand the jump. Not really. You’d have to have personally been trapped and felt flames to really understand a terror way beyond falling.

Elf has felt the flames and needs to jump. Yoli and her mother are fascinating because while they neither feel the flames nor exactly understand Elf's perspective, they nonetheless feel the horrid heat. They've experienced depression, and they've buried loved ones; they have a more evolved comprehension of depression and suicide than most people. As a result, Yoli's conversations with Elf are utterly magnetic. They obviously love each other as sisters immensely and have an almost begrudgingly mutual respect, but they're also bitter about what they've put each other through. They scream "I hate you!" at each other in the suicide ward, and then crack bleak jokes beneath fluorescence. They're family.

All My Puny Sorrows Opens Up a Dialogue About Suicide

An important thing that All My Puny Sorrows addresses is that depression is nobody's 'fault;' nobody really chose their depression, regardless of whether nature or nurture is to blame. Society often targets the depressed person as 'lazy' or 'not trying hard enough.' This unhealthy fallacy is shattered by Elf in an efficient little description of the nihilism that depression often invokes, no matter how hard a person may try:

When I wake up in the morning, I have moments of excruciating hope. The sun has risen, and I think maybe today will be different. But that day always darkens, it never changes. I'm certain that the future will be an endless repetition of the same disappointment. No matter how hard I try, I can't see beyond it.

"It seems like such a selfish thing to do," one character in All My Puny Sorrows says, incongruous to the painful but honest truths of the rest of the film. This character is unfortunately all too representative of the typical response to suicide, along with the people Elf resents, who equate intelligence with optimism and a zest for life. In a magical (albeit depressing) way, McGowan's film has the potential to change these kinds of minds.

With its excellent direction, script, and performances (with everyone excelling in the most tremendous of ways), All My Puny Sorrows masterfully reveals the fiery threat so many depressed people face. It engenders empathy in the audience toward individuals with depression and suicidal ideation and even makes a small but important argument for assisted suicide without taking any obvious, on-the-nose stance. With its refusal to moralize, judge, or condemn anyone who suffers, All My Puny Sorrows stakes out its place as a quiet masterpiece with the ability to create perspective and put out some fires in the process.

A Toronto International Film Festival official selection, and from Mongrel Media, All My Puny Sorrows is available on-demand and on digital now.

Flickering Myth

Geek Culture | Movies, TV, Comic Books & Video Games

Movie Review – All My Puny Sorrows (2022)

May 3, 2022 by Robert Kojder

All My Puny Sorrows . 2022

Written and Directed by Michael McGowan. Starring Alison Pill, Sarah Gadon, Amybeth McNulty, Mare Winningham, Donal Logue, Mimi Kuzyk, Michael Musi, and Aly Mawji.

The poignant story of two sisters-one a concert pianist obsessed with ending her life, the other, a writer, who in wrestling with this decision, makes profound discoveries about her herself.

There are several moments in All My Puny Sorrows where its literary origins feel like a detrimental crutch rather than a script organically transferred across entertainment mediums. One of the protagonists is an unsuccessful writer that happens to be obsessed with poetry to a point where it feels like writer and director Michael McGowan (adapting the celebrated book from Miriam Toews) either doesn’t know how to pen some of these dialogue exchanges naturalistically or can’t help over-relying on passages from famous poets (which I’m sure are also in the novel) and excessive narration. Even the title of the film comes from poetry.

However, the story, dealing with the sensitive subjects of suicide and depression, is routinely thoughtfully handled and grounded by a pair of emotionally riveting performances from tight-knit Mennonite siblings Yoli and Elf (with Alison Pill and Sarah Gadon inhabiting those bizarre character names and compellingly broken characters). Elf happens to be the sister with a noteworthy career, loving husband, and generally easy-going adult life but is the one checked into a psych ward following a suicide attempt before an international pianist tour. This elicits a wide range of emotions from Yoli, ranging from empathy to bitterness, jealousy, and sometimes outright anger. It’s reasonable considering that despite going through a divorce, shaming herself over embracing sexuality, becoming estranged from her teenage daughter (Amybeth McNulty from Stranger Things ), who is quick to throw every one of her mom’s mistakes and failures right back into her face as an impulsive reaction to criticism, and struggling to finish the next novel for an unremarkable career is, while still depressed, holding it together mentally.

When the script is simply allowing the sisters to interact with one another, whether it be discussing their tragic generational family history with suicide (the film opens showing their father stepping foot onto some train tracks), growing up as Mennonites, and simply lifting one another while simultaneously being at each other’s throats, it’s a raw depiction of what feels like authentic conversations regarding mental health. The situation takes its toll on Yoli, notably during an intense verbal blowup on a deserving asshole stranger after incorrectly parking her car in the hospital garage. The segment is even joked about because sometimes when life is that miserable (there are also other subplots with her mom and aunt stressing her out), what can you do but laugh at your mounting frustrations hoping for some cathartic release?

All My Puny Sorrows also introduces some potential character choices that could have disastrously ruined any goodwill so far, coming across as blatantly offensive. It thankfully avoids these trappings while also examining the role of therapists and doctors in some infuriating ways that also feel true to life. Admittedly, there is sometimes too much going on, and the third act takes some unnecessary detours away from the story’s strengths. It’s also flat-out grating how often narration and poetry are ham-fistedly delivered, especially when substituting for dialogue in an otherwise piercing and raw script.

In terms of emotional power, All My Puny Sorrows is a stinger anchored by a pair of outstanding performances. Dealing with touchy subjects such as suicide, it also could have gone south at any moment but largely remains absorbing and earnest.

Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★

Robert Kojder is a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association and the Critics Choice Association. He is also the Flickering Myth Reviews Editor. Check here for new reviews, follow my Twitter or Letterboxd , or email me at [email protected]

YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE:

The Most Obscure and Underrated Slasher Movies of the 1980s

Batman Beyond at 25: The Story Behind the Batman of the Future

The Best Horror Movies of 2023

The Best 90s and 00s Horror Movies That Rotten Tomatoes Hates!

The Essential One Man Army Action Movies

The Enviable “Worst” Films of David Fincher

The Essential Man vs Machine Sci-Fi B-Movies

Lifeforce: A Film Only Cannon Could Have Made

The Passion of the Christ at 20: Mel Gibson’s Controversial Biblical Film Revisited

Kevin Costner’s Horizon: The Western That Made Him Leave Yellowstone Explained

Comic Books
Video Games
Toys & Collectibles
Articles and Opinions
About Flickering Myth
Write for Flickering Myth
Advertise on Flickering Myth
Terms of Use
Privacy Policy

Common Sense Media

Movie & TV reviews for parents

For Parents
For Educators
Our Work and Impact

Or browse by category:

Get the app
Movie Reviews
Best Movie Lists
Best Movies on Netflix, Disney+, and More

Common Sense Selections for Movies

50 Modern Movies All Kids Should Watch Before They're 12

Best TV Lists
Best TV Shows on Netflix, Disney+, and More
Common Sense Selections for TV
Video Reviews of TV Shows

Best Kids' Shows on Disney+

Best Kids' TV Shows on Netflix

Book Reviews
Best Book Lists
Common Sense Selections for Books

8 Tips for Getting Kids Hooked on Books

50 Books All Kids Should Read Before They're 12

Game Reviews
Best Game Lists

Common Sense Selections for Games

Video Reviews of Games

Nintendo Switch Games for Family Fun

Podcast Reviews
Best Podcast Lists

Common Sense Selections for Podcasts

Parents' Guide to Podcasts

App Reviews
Best App Lists

Social Networking for Teens

Gun-Free Action Game Apps

Reviews for AI Apps and Tools

YouTube Channel Reviews
YouTube Kids Channels by Topic

Parents' Ultimate Guide to YouTube Kids

Explaining the News to Our Kids

Family Tech Planners
Digital Skills
All Articles
Latino Culture
Black Voices
Asian Stories
Native Narratives
LGBTQ+ Pride
Best of Diverse Representation List

Celebrating Black History Month

Movies and TV Shows with Arab Leads

Celebrate Hip-Hop's 50th Anniversary

All my puny sorrows, common sense media reviewers.

Moving, heavy drama about suicide has some sex, language.

Two women look out over a bleak winter landscape.

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

Letting go of grief can be just as painful, or eve

Yoli, Elf, Lottie, and Nora model communication an

All the main characters are White. There's a Black

No violence is directly shown, but suicide is a ce

A couple is in bed under covers with thrusting noi

"F--k," "f--king," "s--t," "jackass," and "slut."

An adult drinks from what looks like a beer bottle

Positive Messages

Letting go of grief can be just as painful, or even more so, than the grief itself, but we're meant to move on. No matter what blows life deals you, you find a way to keep going, little by little, because you're alive.

Positive Role Models

Yoli, Elf, Lottie, and Nora model communication and compassion in a close-knit, loving family. All but Elf model perseverance. Elf finds life too painful and wants to die, but her family all find ways to keep going even through grief.

Diverse Representations

All the main characters are White. There's a Black hospital psychiatrist, and Elf's husband has brown skin and dark hair. No differences besides mental health are represented.

Did we miss something on diversity? Suggest an update.

Violence & Scariness

No violence is directly shown, but suicide is a central theme. A man is shown standing on a railroad track as a freight train approaches; abrupt cut away at moment of impact. Wanting to die to end the pain of existence is talked about in-depth. Some shots of books and webpages with specific information on how to commit suicide, but none are directly talked about. A victim of suicide is shown in a coffin with only hair and hands visible. Finding someone who had tried to commit suicide mentions blood everywhere; no other description.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

Sex, Romance & Nudity

A couple is in bed under covers with thrusting noises and grunting. Some kissing between a couple in a car, with a woman on a man's lap. A woman takes her clothes off in a nonsexual situation to intimidate someone; no sensitive body parts are shown.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Sex, Romance & Nudity in your kid's entertainment guide.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Language in your kid's entertainment guide.

Drinking, Drugs & Smoking

An adult drinks from what looks like a beer bottle. Mention of finding lots of bottles of wine. A doctor mentions prescriptions for Valproic and cariprazine. Several mentions of taking and not taking medication.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Drinking, Drugs & Smoking in your kid's entertainment guide.

Parents Need to Know

Parents need to know that All My Puny Sorrows is a psychological drama based on a book by the same name. It's about two sisters, one of whom wants to die, tries to kill herself, and eventually -- spoiler alert -- succeeds. Their father also killed himself, and flashbacks show his final moments. No direct acts of violence are shown, but pain, suffering, and wanting to die are central to the story. A scene in bed shows a couple under covers thrusting and grunting. One other scene shows a couple kissing in a car while one is on the other's lap. Strong language includes "f--k," "s--t," and variations. An adult drinks from what looks like a beer bottle, and there's a mention of seeing lots of wine bottles around the home. To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails .

Where to Watch

Videos and photos.

Community Reviews

Parents say

There aren't any parent reviews yet. Be the first to review this title.

What's the Story?

ALL MY PUNY SORROWS is the story of two sisters in their 30s. Yoli ( Alison Pill ) is a mother to 16-year-old Nora and a struggling novelist. Elf ( Sarah Gadon ) is a famous concert pianist who wants to die. The story begins with Elf in the hospital after she was found and saved, against her wishes, by her mother, Lottie. Yoli comes to visit Elf in the hospital, and the two spend a lot of time talking about life, pain, and Elf's desire to go to a clinic in Switzerland where she can end her life with dignity. They also remember their lives growing up together and shared tragedies like their father's suicide. Elf seems to be getting better and is released from the hospital to resume her regular life. But Yoli is sure it's too soon, and that Elf is only pretending to feel better.

Is It Any Good?

This is a quiet, moving, and emotionally intense movie that takes on the difficult subject of suicide. All My Puny Sorrows treats the subjects, and its characters, with compassion and warmth, and sometimes gentle humor, too. The strong acting creates a solid foundation for exploring life, pain, death, sisterhood, art, literature, and so much more. Some of the events are a little confusing to place when you're sometimes not sure if it's a flashback or not. And while most of them are moving and lovely, some of the scenes of Elf and Yoli talking in the hospital go on a bit too long, or seem to repeat ground that's already been covered.

There's only one teen character, so appeal may be limited, but it will inspire empathy for people who struggle with day-to-day living. Mature viewers who won't be triggered by the subject, and who can handle the mature themes, will find a lot of food for thought about whether and when a person can decide to end their life.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about how All My Puny Sorrows deals with suicide . It can be hard to talk about. Did the movie change any ideas you had about it? Have you ever thought about it, or do you know someone who has? What would help you, or how can you help someone else?

What about Elf's mental health ? How does the movie portray her thoughts, her treatment, and its effects on her loved ones?

What about the strong language? Is it too much? Is it realistic, and does that make a difference?

Movie Details

On DVD or streaming : May 3, 2022
Cast : Alison Pill , Sarah Gadon , Mare Winningham , AmyBeth McNulty
Director : Michael McGowan
Inclusion Information : Female actors, Bisexual actors
Studio : Momentum Pictures
Genre : Drama
Topics : Brothers and Sisters
Run time : 103 minutes
MPAA rating : R
MPAA explanation : language and brief sexuality
Last updated : October 8, 2022

Did we miss something on diversity?

Research shows a connection between kids' healthy self-esteem and positive portrayals in media. That's why we've added a new "Diverse Representations" section to our reviews that will be rolling out on an ongoing basis. You can help us help kids by suggesting a diversity update.

Suggest an Update

Our editors recommend.

Indignation

Want personalized picks for your kids' age and interests?

The Seagull

Dr. Bird's Advice for Sad Poets

Drama tv for teens, drama movies that tug at the heartstrings, related topics.

Brothers and Sisters

Want suggestions based on your streaming services? Get personalized recommendations

Common Sense Media's unbiased ratings are created by expert reviewers and aren't influenced by the product's creators or by any of our funders, affiliates, or partners.

All My Puny Sorrows (2021)

User Reviews

Awards | FAQ | User Ratings | External Reviews | Metacritic Reviews

User Ratings
External Reviews
Metacritic Reviews
Full Cast and Crew
Release Dates
Official Sites
Company Credits
Filming & Production
Technical Specs
Plot Summary
Plot Keywords
Parents Guide

Did You Know?

Crazy Credits
Alternate Versions
Connections
Soundtracks

Photo & Video

Photo Gallery
Trailers and Videos

Screen Rant

Tiff review: all my puny sorrows is poignant, but doesn't dig deep enough.

Steeped in heartbreaking turmoil and layered performances, the film is lackluster when exploring the characters and their history with mental illness.

Warning: The film and this review mentions depression and suicide.

Written and directed by Michael McGowan, All My Puny Sorrows is an adaptation of Miriam Toews’ 2014 novel of the same name. The film, a drama that centers two sisters, one who is recovering from attempted suicide and the other who is pleading with her not to die, is a mish-mash of intensely-felt emotions and half-baked character backstories. When the story is focused on the present, it goes a long way in its willingness to bring up uncomfortable truths and feelings. Steeped in heartbreaking turmoil and layered performances, the film is lackluster when exploring the characters and their history with mental illness.

Yoli Von Riesen (Alison Pill) is a successful writer who is struggling to finish her next novel after the last one bombed. She’s in the middle of a divorce from an ex-husband who is frustrated by her refusal to sign the papers when she is called back to her hometown following her sister Elfrieda’s (Sarah Gadon), “Elf” for short, suicide attempt. Yoli is angry and frustrated with Elf, a renowned pianist who is resigned to death despite her sister’s protests and unwillingness to let her go. In the midst of all this is their mother, Lottie (Mare Winningham), a stoic woman who rarely lets her emotions past the wall she’s seemingly put up after Jake (Donal Logue), her husband and the women’s father, died by suicide years prior.

Related: TIFF Review: The Starling Lacks Emotional Substance Despite Strong Performances

The title of the film (and book) is taken from the poem “To a Friend” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, in which the poet writes about his relationship with his only sister, to which he poured all his “puny sorrows.” It’s apt considering the story centers on two sisters whose snarky comments to each other, family history, and generally deep discussions are the beating heart of this uneven film. McGowan’s adaptation is deeply moving, emotionally driven, and often riveting to watch. Yoli is the driving force and her emotions, riddled with anger, love, desperation, resentment, and a dose of sarcasm and dark humor, are messy and deeply complex. However, for the story to unfold primarily through her perspective is also frustrating, especially since the writing isn’t interested in offering more than a vague reading of her and her family’s past.

The film suggests the Mennonite community — which the Von Riesen family was a part of, and of the church in particular — deepened Yoli’s father’s depression, which no one knew he struggled with. But there isn’t an exploration of this nor of Elfrieda’s own depression beyond an impassioned speech she gives to Yoli about how she really feels and its effects on her mind. While the family has a history of mental illness, there isn’t much depth given to the subject or to the people at its center, with the story defaulting to Yoli’s perspective to guide viewers. The result is rather empty and stifled in its handling of suicide and depression. There’s no doubt that the feelings in the film are complex and incredibly real, but the film refrains from delving any further than it needs to, leaving the audience with thinly veiled impressions rather than a firm handle on its presentation.

Since the family history is all so unclear — there are hints the Mennonite church pushed them out of the community and Jake’s superiors were not thrilled with Elfrieda wanting to study music — there’s a lot to be desired when it comes to All My Puny Sorrows’ discussion and portrayal of mental illness overall. All that said, Alison Pill gives an incredibly moving performance. As Yoli, she is frustrated, mentally exhausted, and she wants so desperately to keep her family together that it’s difficult not to sympathize with her. Pill’s portrayal is nuanced and deeply human. Sarah Gadon, though offered slightly less material to work with, does a tremendous job capturing Elf’s detachment, resolve, and general emotional state in a way that is more layered than the screenplay presents.

The film doesn’t pretend to have any answers, driven as it is by the characters’ complicated feelings in the midst of tragedy and lasting trauma. And, while its performances are lovely and tender, with the execution somewhat messy in its handling of themes, All My Puny Sorrows doesn’t dig past the surface enough to make a strong enough case for itself.

Next: TIFF Review: Petite Maman Is A Thoughtful Exploration Of A Mother-Daughter Bond

All My Puny Sorrows had its premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 10, 2021. The film is 103 minutes long and is not yet rated.

All My Puny Sorrows (2023)

spectrum on demand

watch later

not interested / hide

Play Trailer

subscription

Read our dedicated guide on how to watch All My Puny Sorrows (2023)

18 Best Streaming Services for Watching Westerns

8 Best Live TV Streaming Services with DVR

Amazon Prime Video Review 2024

Hulu + Live TV Review 2024

Emil Hofileña

Speaking as a writer: writers are very good at being sad, but sometimes we're just as good at being impossible to understand.

What it's about

Based on the novel by Women Talking author Miriam Toews, this adaptation of All My Puny Sorrows holds clear reverence for its source material but falls short of making a case for its existence as a film. Toews's prose—significant parts of which writer/director Michael McGowan has kept intact in the dialogue—may be appropriate for a book that allows full internal access to its narrator, but on film her words come across as overly articulate and artificial, even if they speak beautiful, harsh truths about grief. And without a defined visual identity or proper flow of ideas to back up its admittedly complex characters (played with authentic tenderness and force by Alison Pill, Sarah Gadon, and Mare Winningham), the film ends up stuck in its own darkness, unable to give a proper form to all its thoughts.

What stands out

Add a comment, more like this in, character-driven, thought-provoking.

The Trial of the Chicago 7 (2020)

A star-studded and riveting legal drama with a blockbuster feel.

Forgotten Love (2023)

The stunning third take of the classic Polish pre-war melodrama

The Guilty (2018)

A minimalist, razor-sharp thriller that will have you gasping for air.

System Crasher (2019)

A tale of trauma and one of the most talked about movies on Netflix in 2020.

The Monk and the Gun (2024)

Pawo Choyning Dorji depicts Bhutan through this fascinatingly gentle comedy during its shift to democracy

Art of Love (2024)

An underwhelming heist romance with all of the style but none of the thrills

Leave the World Behind (2023)

Shyamalan meets Black Mirror in this hugely entertaining, visually inventive apocalyptic thriller with a killer ending

Hail Satan? (2019)

Forget everything you think you know about the Satanic Temple

Thank You, I’m Sorry (2023)

Estranged sisters reconnect amidst grief and bizarre comedy in this understated Swedish drama

Last Call for Istanbul (2023)

A seemingly generic Turkish romance travel film, until it gets into its second half

Curated by humans, not algorithms.

Supported by

‘All My Puny Sorrows,’ by Miriam Toews

Share full article

By Curtis Sittenfeld

Nov. 21, 2014

In a 2013 exchange that’s become famous in literary circles, the novelist Claire Messud took to task an interviewer at Publishers Weekly who observed that she — the interviewer — wouldn’t want to be friends with the protagonist of Messud’s most recent novel and asked if Messud herself felt the same way.

“For heaven’s sake, what kind of question is that?” Messud responded. “If you’re reading to find friends, you’re in deep trouble. We read to find life, in all its possibilities. The relevant question isn’t ‘Is this a potential friend for me?’ but ‘Is this character alive?’ ”

For the most part, I agree with Messud, yet as I devoured Miriam Toews’s latest novel, “All My Puny Sorrows,” I thought that I’d very much like to befriend the main character. In fact, spending time in the company of Yoli, a 40-something woman alternately busy with the work of caring for various family members and screwing up her own life, was the main reason I loved the book.

It’s a testament to the entertaining voice, emotional acuity and quick pacing of “All My Puny Sorrows” that it doesn’t become evident until about two-thirds of the way through how slight the plot is: Yoli has traveled to Winnipeg from her home in Toronto because her sister, Elfrieda, a brilliant and successful classical pianist, has — not for the first time — attempted suicide. Elfrieda, a.k.a. Elf, is now in the psychiatric unit of a hospital, and most of the book’s suspense arises from the questions of whether she’ll attempt suicide again and whether she’ll persuade Yoli to help her. Many pages are devoted to the daily pattern of waiting out a family member’s hospital stay: trying to extract information from doctors and nurses, trying not to let non-hospital-related obligations fall into disarray, hugging, crying, hugging while crying, procuring food and sleeping (usually not well).

Such a synopsis would not, if I hadn’t read the book, seem to me enticing, but “All My Puny Sorrows” is irresistible. The flashbacks to Yoli and Elf’s childhood in a rural Mennonite community are vivid and energetic. In both the past and present, Toews (who is the author of six earlier books that have received significantly more recognition in her native Canada than in the United States) perfectly captures the casual manner in which close-knit sisters enjoy and irritate each other. The dialogue is realistic and funny, and somehow, almost magically, Toews gets away with having her characters discuss things like books and art and the meaning of life without seeming pretentious or precious; they’re simply smart, decent and confused.

It’s Yoli who is the story’s heroine, though she wouldn’t believe it. Relentlessly self-deprecating, she explains that she “had two kids with two different guys . . . as a type of social experiment. Just kidding. As a type of social failure.” She is semi-amicably ending her second marriage and receives a text from her soon-to-be-ex-husband that reads, “I need you.” When she texts back asking if he’s O.K., he replies: “Sorry, pushed send too soon. I need you to sign the divorce papers.” In contrast to her famous sister, Yoli is the author of an unremarkable Y.A. series called Rodeo Rhonda and is also trying to write a more literary novel, which she carries around in a plastic Safeway bag. She gets lost in the hospital’s basement, has impulsive sex with her car mechanic and, when she gets a recorded phone call asking if her debt has become uncontrollable, whispers into the phone, “Yes, yes, it has,” then hangs up.

Per the Messud Doctrine, Yoli is bracingly alive, as is everyone with whom she interacts, even as the possibility of Elf’s death looms over them. “All My Puny Sorrows” is unsettling, because how can a novel about suicide not be? But its intelligence, its honesty and, above all, its compassion provide a kind of existential balm — a comfort not unlike the sort you might find by opening a bottle of wine and having a long conversation with (yes, really) a true friend.

ALL MY PUNY SORROWS

By Miriam Toews

317 pp. McSweeney’s. $24.

Curtis Sittenfeld’s most recent novel is “Sisterland.”

Explore More in Books

Want to know about the best books to read and the latest news start here..

James McBride’s novel sold a million copies, and he isn’t sure how he feels about that, as he considers the critical and commercial success of “The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store.”

How did gender become a scary word? Judith Butler, the theorist who got us talking about the subject , has answers.

You never know what’s going to go wrong in these graphic novels, where Circus tigers, giant spiders, shifting borders and motherhood all threaten to end life as we know it .

When the author Tommy Orange received an impassioned email from a teacher in the Bronx, he dropped everything to visit the students who inspired it.

Do you want to be a better reader? Here’s some helpful advice to show you how to get the most out of your literary endeavor .

Each week, top authors and critics join the Book Review’s podcast to talk about the latest news in the literary world. Listen here .

International edition
Australia edition
Europe edition

Glorious movie debut … Julie Andrews as Mary Poppins

Mary Poppins review – Disney’s entertainment sugar rush possesses thermonuclear brilliance

Manic, magic, madcap … Julie Andrews is superb in the role of the flying nanny, in a film filled with amazing songs

B rilliant, entrancing, exhausting, and with thermonuclear showtunes from Richard and Robert Sherman, Disney’s hybrid live-action/animation classic from 1964 is now rereleased on home entertainment platforms for its 60th anniversary. And it has a brand-new certificate from the BBFC : upgraded from a U to a PG on account of “discriminatory language” from the eccentric seadog character Admiral Boom, who fires a cannon from his roof shouting “Fight the Hottentots!” (an obsolete term for South Africa’s indigenous Khoekhoe people ). However the BBFC is evidently not bothered by the foxhunting scene in which the fox has a cod Irish accent (perhaps because chimney sweep Bert, played by Dick Van Dyke , saves the fox), nor by the cheerful suicide reference made by one of the servants: “Nice spot there by Southwark Bridge, very popular with jumpers!”

In an upmarket part of Edwardian London created on almost dreamlike artificial sets in California, the prosperous upper-middle-class Banks family are having problems controlling their high-spirited children, Michael (Matthew Garber) and Jane (Karen Dotrice); this is grumpy banker George Banks (David Tomlinson) and his suffragette wife Winifred (Glynis Johns), who is always whirling around going to votes-for-women marches. Pompous Mr Banks saunters into the action with complacent song The Life I Lead (which melodically owes a tiny bit to With a Little Bit of Luck from the stage show My Fair Lady).

And so the magical nanny Mary Poppins wafts miraculously down from the heavens to solve all their problems – and this is the glorious movie debut of Julie Andrews , glowing with health and beauty and confidence. Andrews will always be associated with this superb performance, and of course her later appearance in The Sound of Music, in which she also artlessly cures a family’s woes. I have always preferred Andrews in The Sound of Music, because defying the Nazis is more exciting and worthwhile than wimpishly going on a jolly holiday, and feeding the (verminous) birds at tuppence a bag etc. But no one can doubt the lethal power of Mary Poppins. (Naming Mary’s preferred alcoholic cocktail is always a great film quiz standby.)

But when uptight Mr Banks takes the kids to his place of employment and young Michael inadvertently causes the biggest run on a bank since Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life, this stern paterfamilias loses his position and is forced to consider his whole life and how he has been neglecting his children in favour of work (although happily it’s not a quandary he’s in for very long).

Almost dreamlike … Julie Andrews with Dick van Dyke as Bert

It is Mary who introduces the children to the madcap chimney sweep Bert, played by Van Dyke with his notoriously awful cockney accent – which is even more awful considering that Hermione Baddeley is right there, robustly playing the Banks family’s maid Ellen, and giving us a much more convincing London voice. (Actually, Van Dyke’s posh voice as old Mr Dawes is much better.) From the first time I saw this film as a kid, and again now, I have always wondered: are Bert and Mary in love or not? Mary sings to him: “Gentlemen like you are few / Though you’re just a diamond in the rough, Bert / Underneath, your blood is blue / You’d never think of pressing your advantage / Forbearance is the hallmark of your creed / A lady needn’t fear when you are near …” Pressing his “advantage”? A lady not needing to fear? Well, I should hope not, though perhaps poor Bert certainly does have a hopeless platonic thing for Mary, possibly the most romantically unattainable figure in film history. She is also arguably a manic pixie dream nanny, though it’s Bert who is also manic, particularly when he does his interminable Step in Time rooftop knees-up with all the other sweeps.

There are lots of genius moments here, and A Spoonful of Sugar and Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious are amazing songs. I have to admit that I find the real brilliance of the film is in the first act and things have wound down by the end, but what an entertainment sugar rush.

after newsletter promotion

Mary Poppins
Julie Andrews
Dick Van Dyke
Walt Disney Company
Animation in film

Comments (…)

Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire review: a very flimsy monster mash

“The underwhelming effects give you new appreciation for what the Oscar-winning 2023 movie Godzilla Minus One did at a fraction of the cost.”

There's a big ape and a big lizard
Godzilla's pink spikes look cool
The human stuff is a drag
The effects are underwhelming
It's all so weightless

There’s no weight to anything in Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire . Certainly no figurative weight — this tag-team adventure for the most iconic giant monsters of movieland has all the gravitas of a toy commercial. But no physical weight either. Though its marquee attractions loom like mountains, we never feel their footsteps in our bones, never get the tingling sensation that something impossibly heavy stands before us. At one point, the big beasts crash through the Egyptian pyramids — those ancient wonders of architectural ingenuity — and we might as well be watching a sandcastle blow away. It’s all so flimsy .

This expensive eyesore, this gimcrack nothing of a blockbuster, has the misfortune of arriving in the immediate aftermath of the newly minted Oscar winner Godzilla Minus One . Now there was a kaiju movie; exciting and soulful, it brought its 70-year-old marquee attraction back to his roots as a terrifying allegory for postwar Japan. Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire , the latest in the big guy’s parallel Hollywood franchise, is more like the frivolous Toho monster smackdowns of the 1970s, when Godzilla had become a jokey, kid-friendly defender of humanity. At least those movies had some actual weight to them — as in, the kind carried by real stuntmen in real suits stomping on real models. Here, everything on-screen is a digital mirage, a cluster of 0s and 1s lumbering across a glittering backdrop of the same.

The previous movie in the series, surprise pandemic hit Godzilla vs. Kong , was no great shakes either. But it had the advantage of leaning on its Vegas fight-promoter hype — the promise of two colossal headliners whaling on each other for the first time in half a century. The New Empire lacks even that hook. Nor does it much capitalize on the promise of these frenemies begrudgingly joining forces. Though that little x in the title is supposedly silent, it might as well be a slash given the little screen time the reptile and ape share.

Most of The New Empire unfolds across Hollow Earth, aka the Vernian lost world at the center of our own, which was discovered by the scientists of the last movie. With its gaudy, multicolored foliage and flocks of pterodactyl, the place suggests what Pandora might look like if James Cameron spent only a long weekend rendering it. While director Gareth Edwards shot the first entry in this reboot series mostly on location, augmenting real landscapes with effects afterwards, The New Empire has the flat, anti-immersive scenery of a movie made almost entirely on a soundstage draped in green screen.

Picking up where Godzilla vs. Kong left off, the plot is nonsense even by the standards of movies aimed at 8-year-olds of all ages. It hinges on Kong, long believed to be the last of his kind, stumbling upon a tribe of fellow massive apes in an uncharted stretch of Hollow Earth. These distant relatives include an aggressively cute toddler of Mighty Joe Young proportions, as well as the movie’s villain, a crimson-colored anti-Kong who wields a chain-like melee weapon and plots to mount an attack on the world above because … well, does an evil giant ape really need motive ? Still, one might wish returning director Adam Wingard ( The Guest ) spared even a moment on Kong’s desire for belonging. Long scenes of chest-beating territorial conflict evoke Planet of the Apes , but without the, well, humanity Andy Serkis has lent his primate characters.

This is, as it might be clear, more of a King Kong movie than a Godzilla movie. That focal point makes sense: The ape is the more expressive character — and by dint of his shared-ancestor lineage, easier to project upon. But where does that leave Toho’s finest? Mostly running errands on the periphery. Edwards used the G-man sparingly, too — it remains a point of contention for fans — but he made each appearance count. Wingard can’t seem to find much for Godzilla to do before the inevitable fisticuffs climax; he curls up for a quick nap in the Colosseum and gets his spikes done, emerging with spiffy hot-pink radioactive highlights. Who knew a 400-foot dinosaur could look bored?

As for the humans, they’re a motley assortment of new and returning spectators. The once more sprawling ensemble has been whittled down to an earnest scientist (Rebecca Hall), a jaunty veterinarian (Dan Stevens), a neurotic comic-relief podcaster ( Causeway ‘s Brian Tyree Henry), and the last daughter of Skull Island (Kaylee Hottle), whose orphanhood mirrors Kong’s. Can you really blame Millie Bobby Brown, among others, for jumping ship? There’s little for an actor to do in these movies but spout pseudoscience or quips. While Godzilla Minus One proved it was possible to care about the people in a giant-monster movie, The New Empire can’t even be bothered to make it seem like the performers are occupying the same universe as their CGI co-stars. Never once do they convincingly interact with the monsters they won’t shut up about.

Not that the kaiju stuff is any better. The underwhelming effects give you new appreciation for what Godzilla Minus One did at a fraction of the cost. And the spectacle succumbs to what we might now call the Quantumania problem, shrinking away the fun of the material by removing any sense of scale. What’s the point of making a movie about creatures of skyscraper stature if you’re not going to emphasize their size through contrast? Setting the action primarily within a jungle landscape, away from throngs of puny humans, misplaces the lizard-brain appeal of a Godzilla movie. Even when the action shifts to a metropolitan arena, Wingard deflatingly opts for medium shots that fail to convey just how damn large these warring titans are meant to be.

Edwards knew better. For all his 2014 Godzilla divisively denied the audience instant gratification, it was a triumph of scale; by shooting the carnage from the ground and framing it through a terrified civilian perspective, he made the monsters look unfathomably massive — and in their computergenerated way, almost real, too. The sequels, supposedly course correcting away from the restraint of that franchise-launching hit, have delivered bigger doses of prehistoric combat, the dumb fun we were said to have been deprived. But they’ve also tacked steadily away from anything resembling grandeur. The New Empire is a new low in that respect. It’s big in a very small way.

Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire opens in theaters everywhere Friday, March 29. For more of A.A. Dowd’s writing, visit his Authory page .

Editors' Recommendations

Godzilla vs. Kong review: It’s everything it promises and then some
Product Reviews

March is almost over and, well, it's a bit sad to see the month end. Why? Well, if you're a movie fan, you've experienced an embarrassment of riches both in theaters and at home. Dune: Part Two brought back the big-budget spectacle while TV shows like Shōgun have reminded people that TV can still churn out Game of Thrones-style epics.

Netflix has also had a killer month with entertaining shows like The Gentlemen and original movies like Damsel. Chances are, you've probably seen both of those, so if you're still looking for stuff to watch this weekend, we have you covered. Digital Trends has compiled a list of three underrated movies on Netflix that are worth watching this weekend.

Timing is everything in the entertainment industry, but there's no way that Netflix could have known that this week was the perfect time to start streaming Ben Affleck's 2016 thriller, The Accountant. Earlier this month, Amazon Prime Video picked up the rights to make The Accountant 2, with Affleck slated to reprise his role as the title character. That's the kind of synergy money can't buy, and possibly one of the reasons why The Accountant is now on top of the list of the most popular movies on Netflix.

As it turns out, Netflix does have one more big original movie for the final weekend of March: A remake of The Wages of Fear. Between that movie and The Accountant, action thriller fans are going to have a good weekend. But if you're looking for more than just action and thrills, then keep reading our complete list of the best movies on Netflix right now. There's something here for everyone.

The last weekend of the month tends to be the slowest among the major streaming services, and that's especially true for Amazon Prime Video. New movies are just a few days away from arriving on Prime Video on the first of the month. But until then, there just isn't anything fresh at all.

At times like these, we feel that it's best to look to the classics. So this week, we're putting our spotlight on two great movies from the past: Witness and Rob Roy. But if you absolutely need to watch something from this century, you could always catch up on the Prime Video originals from earlier this month, which include the remake of Road House and the R-rated comedy Ricky Stanicky. And there are even more options ahead in our complete roundup of the best movies on Amazon Prime Video right now.

IMAGES

‎All My Puny Sorrows (2021) directed by Michael McGowan • Reviews, film
Prime Video: All My Puny Sorrows
Prime Video: All My Puny Sorrows
Review: All My Puny Sorrows
All My Puny Sorrows’ review by Adam Milne • Letterboxd
All My Puny Sorrows 2021 Full HD Film izle

COMMENTS

All My Puny Sorrows movie review (2022)
The film opens with Donal Logue, standing on railroad tracks, staring at a train approaching, awaiting his own death, a death he chose. It's an image McGowan comes back to again and again. "All My Puny Sorrows" is woven through with collage-like fragments of this moment and others, showing the past, the two sisters as children, the glimpses of ...
All My Puny Sorrows
Based on Miriam Toews' best-selling novel, All My Puny Sorrows unexpectedly infuses wry humor into this heart-wrenching story of two loving sisters: one a gifted pianist (Sarah Gadon) obsessed ...
'All My Puny Sorrows' Review: Every Day, a Little Death
All My Puny Sorrows Rated R for language and references to sex and suicide. Running time: 1 hour 43 minutes. Running time: 1 hour 43 minutes. Rent or buy on Apple TV , Google Play and other ...
'All My Puny Sorrows' Review
'All My Puny Sorrows': Film Review | TIFF 2021. Based on the semi-autobiographical novel by Miriam Toews, the drama stars Alison Pill as a struggling novelist trying to help her brilliant big ...
All My Puny Sorrows
All My Puny Sorrows is an emotional movie that embraces the totality of the situation, the exasperation, sorrow and even occasional humor. Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Apr 14, 2022
'All My Puny Sorrows' Review: A Sincere But Stilted Grief Drama
'All My Puny Sorrows' Review: Two Sisters Debate the Merits of Living in a Sincere But Stilted Grief Drama Reviewed online, May 5, 2022. In Toronto, Santa Barbara film festivals.
All My Puny Sorrows Movie Review
The premise of All My Puny Sorrows is so bleak that the movie could easily be a depressing slog to watch. What's remarkable about writer-director Michael McGowan's adaptation of Miriam Toews' bestselling novel is that it's often warm and funny, even when dealing with extremely heavy subject matter. McGowan and star Alison Pill give All My Puny ...
Review: Exquisite adaptation of Miriam Toews' All My Puny Sorrows will
It's that juxtaposition of puny and sorrow, that heightened awareness of the bitter-sweetness of being human, that slays me. Our individual sorrows, when we are suffering them, are everything.
All My Puny Sorrows
All My Puny Sorrows - Metacritic. 2022. R. Momentum Pictures. 1 h 43 m. Summary Based on the international best-selling novel by Miriam Toews, All My Puny Sorrows is the poignant story of two sisters-one a concert pianist obsessed with ending her life, the other, a writer, who in wrestling with this decision, makes profound discoveries about ...
All My Puny Sorrows (2021)
Film Movie Reviews All My Puny Sorrows — 2021. All My Puny Sorrows. 2021. 1h 43m. Drama. Advertisement. Cast. ... All My Puny Sorrows is the poignant story of two sisters, one a concert pianist ...
All My Puny Sorrows Review: A Near-Perfect Exploration of ...
All My Puny Sorrows, based on the somewhat semi-autobiographical novel from Miriam Toews, focuses on a family who understands depression and suicide.The Von Riesens have lost many of their members ...
All My Puny Sorrows (2021)
All My Puny Sorrows: Directed by Michael McGowan. With Alison Pill, Sarah Gadon, Mare Winningham, Donal Logue. Based on the 2014 international best-selling novel by Miriam Toews, All My Puny Sorrows is the poignant story of two sisters, one a concert pianist obsessed with ending her life, and the other a writer who, in wrestling with this decision, makes profound discoveries about her herself.
All My Puny Sorrows (2022)
All My Puny Sorrows. 2022 Written and Directed by Michael McGowan. Starring Alison Pill, Sarah Gadon, Amybeth McNulty, Mare Winningham, Donal Logue, Mimi Kuzyk, Michael Musi, and Aly Mawji ...
All My Puny Sorrows Movie Review
This is a quiet, moving, and emotionally intense movie that takes on the difficult subject of suicide. All My Puny Sorrows treats the subjects, and its characters, with compassion and warmth, and sometimes gentle humor, too. The strong acting creates a solid foundation for exploring life, pain, death, sisterhood, art, literature, and so much ...
All My Puny Sorrows (2021)
Warning: Spoilers. It's a modern drama based in East Village and Winnipeg, Manitoba, and Toronto, Ontario, about two sisters, one of whom is suicidal. It's an adaptation of Miriam Toews' 2014 novel of the same title. In the movie's opening, we see the suicide of the two sisters' father, Jake Von Riesen (Donal Logue).
TIFF 2021 film review: 'All My Puny Sorrows'
Two sisters grapple with generational depression and the lingering pall of suicide in the family drama 'All My Puny Sorrows' (screening during the 46th Toronto International Film Festival). In short: Concert pianist Elf (Sarah Gadon) becomes obsessed with ending her life when her writer sister Yoli (Alison Pill) learns of Elf's intentions.. While 'Sorrows' respectfully finds the emotional ...
All My Puny Sorrows (film)
All My Puny Sorrows is a 2021 Canadian drama film written, produced, and directed by Michael McGowan serving as an adaptation of the 2014 novel of the same name by Miriam Toews.It stars Alison Pill and Sarah Gadon as two Mennonite sisters who leave their religious lives behind. Amybeth McNulty, Mare Winningham, Donal Logue, and Aly Mawji also star in supporting roles, with Mongrel Media set to ...
All in the Family
MOVIE REVIEW All My Puny Sorrows (2021) By SARAH MANVEL. Movies about death are often the most vibrantly alive. How's that for irony? A very early sequence in the wonderful "All My Puny Sorrows" shows a man standing in a railway crossing, working himself up to step into the path of an oncoming train. As the sirens blare and the barriers ...
Film review: All My Puny Sorrows
The comic coda to said scene is a complete corker. All My Puny Sorrows focuses closely on the bond between the sisters - and as luck would have it, the two actors attended the same Toronto ...
TIFF Review: All My Puny Sorrows Is Poignant, But Doesn't Dig Deep Enough
Warning: The film and this review mentions depression and suicide. Written and directed by Michael McGowan, All My Puny Sorrows is an adaptation of Miriam Toews' 2014 novel of the same name. The film, a drama that centers two sisters, one who is recovering from attempted suicide and the other who is pleading with her not to die, is a mish-mash of intensely-felt emotions and half-baked ...
All My Puny Sorrows (2023)
Amazon Prime Video Review 2024. Hulu + Live TV Review 2024. 5.9. Emil Hofileña. ... this adaptation of All My Puny Sorrows holds clear reverence for its source material but falls short of making a case for its existence as a film. Toews's prose—significant parts of which writer/director Michael McGowan has kept intact in the dialogue—may ...
Film review: All My Puny Sorrows stays true to novel's offbeat ...
Often shot against expansive Manitoba skies, the film has a dreamlike, meditative quality that fits the theme: the unknowable puzzle of existence, one that Yoli is trying desperately to unravel. Those skies—like the vast, unmeasurable love of a sister or a mother—make all of our sorrows seem puny.
'All My Puny Sorrows,' by Miriam Toews
It's a testament to the entertaining voice, emotional acuity and quick pacing of "All My Puny Sorrows" that it doesn't become evident until about two-thirds of the way through how slight ...
'Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire' review: Do the puny humans ...
Let's be clear: The human characters in most kaiju movies are worthless plot devices and discardable chum. (Godzilla Minus One is a rare exception.)The surrogate mother-daughter relationship ...
Mary Poppins review
Manic, magic, madcap … Julie Andrews is superb in the role of the flying nanny, in a film filled with amazing songs Brilliant, entrancing, exhausting, and with thermonuclear showtunes from ...
Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire review: flimsy monster mash
Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire review: a very flimsy monster mash. Score Details. "The underwhelming effects give you new appreciation for what the Oscar-winning 2023 movie Godzilla Minus One ...

Movie Reviews

Sheila O'Malley

Now playing

In the Land of Saints and Sinners

Do Not Expect Too Much from the End of the World

Simon Abrams

Little Wing

Drive-Away Dolls

Film Credits

All My Puny Sorrows (2022)

Writer (novel)

Cinematographer

Latest blog posts

A Poet of an Actor: Louis Gossett, Jr. (1936-2024)

Why I Love Ebertfest: A Movie Lover's Dream

Adam Wingard Focuses on the Monsters

Colin Farrell Shines In Apple TV+’s Refined and Genre-Bending Sugar

Log in or sign up for Rotten Tomatoes

Email not verified

Sign up for the Rotten Tomatoes newsletter to get weekly updates on:

Movies / TV

All My Puny Sorrows Reviews

‘All My Puny Sorrows’ Review: Two Sisters Debate the Merits of Living in a Sincere But Stilted Grief Drama

Reviewed online, May 5, 2022. In Toronto, Santa Barbara film festivals. Running time: 103 MIN.

More From Our Brands

All My Puny Sorrows Explores Grief & Depression With Grace & Humor

Exquisite adaptation of Miriam Toews’ All My Puny Sorrows will pierce your heart

Follow related authors and topics

Interact with The Globe

All My Puny Sorrows

Where to Watch

Recommendations

All My Puny Sorrows Review: A Near-Perfect Exploration of Depression

Puny Sorrows is an Understatement

The Brilliant Interactions Between Alison Pill and Sarah Gadon

All My Puny Sorrows Opens Up a Dialogue About Suicide

Movie Review – All My Puny Sorrows (2022)

YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE:

The Most Obscure and Underrated Slasher Movies of the 1980s

Batman Beyond at 25: The Story Behind the Batman of the Future

The Best Horror Movies of 2023

The Best 90s and 00s Horror Movies That Rotten Tomatoes Hates!

The Essential One Man Army Action Movies

The Enviable “Worst” Films of David Fincher

The Essential Man vs Machine Sci-Fi B-Movies

Lifeforce: A Film Only Cannon Could Have Made

The Passion of the Christ at 20: Mel Gibson’s Controversial Biblical Film Revisited

Kevin Costner’s Horizon: The Western That Made Him Leave Yellowstone Explained

Or browse by category:

Common Sense Selections for Movies

50 Modern Movies All Kids Should Watch Before They're 12

Best Kids' Shows on Disney+

Best Kids' TV Shows on Netflix

8 Tips for Getting Kids Hooked on Books

50 Books All Kids Should Read Before They're 12

Common Sense Selections for Games

Nintendo Switch Games for Family Fun

Common Sense Selections for Podcasts

Parents' Guide to Podcasts

Social Networking for Teens

Gun-Free Action Game Apps

Reviews for AI Apps and Tools

Parents' Ultimate Guide to YouTube Kids

YouTube Kids Channels for Gamers

Explaining the News to Our Kids

Celebrating Black History Month

Movies and TV Shows with Arab Leads

Celebrate Hip-Hop's 50th Anniversary

A Lot or a Little?

Positive Messages

Positive Role Models

Diverse Representations

Violence & Scariness

Sex, Romance & Nudity

Drinking, Drugs & Smoking

Parents Need to Know

Where to Watch

Community Reviews

What's the Story?

Is It Any Good?