Take This Waltz

This low-key, intimate Canadian film is in danger of passing by unnoticed. An anatomy of two relationships—a marriage and a court­ship that overlap—the film is excitingly fresh and unconventional, and one of the few bright spots in a dim summer movie season.

The director, Sarah Polley, is also a fine actor, and her approach to filmmaking comes out of her understanding of the way actors can feel their way into roles. Her first directing project, the poignant 2006 drama Away from Her, starred Julie Christie as a woman descending into Alzheimer’s, and the entire movie took its emotional cues from Christie’s intuitiveness.