I had the opportunity to watch this film at the Miami International Film Festival, and I am VERY glad I took up on it! This is what storytelling is all about. Jean-Marc Vallée takes this beautiful story, which is a mix of fiction and reality, and beautifully executes it on film. It's a story that feels realistic, and I was very pleased to see that it's not regionalistic to the point of not being able to be comprehended by others. I thought the acting was amazing and certainly the strong performances bring such a life and realism to the characters that it helps to truly elevate the story, which is really the key to this film. I think especially brilliant were Michel Côté, Marc-André Grondin, Emile Vallée, Danielle Proulx, and Pierre-Luc Brilliant (not to leave anyone out as everyone really shines in their roles, it's just that these to me were the strongest performances of the lot). The choices of music were excellently made and the melding of effects in this film is well done to assist the telling of the story. If you like story-centric films, this is one of the strongest I've ever seen. It has a little of everything: humour, realism, sadness, etc. It's a movie about real life, and while it does have it's surreal moments, it stays true to being about real life.