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Three Identical Strangers
2018 · Film · documentary · 97 min
Directed by Tim Wardle
New York, 1980. Three complete strangers accidentally discover that they're identical triplets, separated at birth. The 19-year-olds' joyous reunion catapults them to international fame, but also unlocks an extraordinary and disturbing secret that goes beyond their own lives – and could transform our understanding of human nature forever.
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As a parent of identical twins watching them develop and grow is fascinating. I do wonder at times how much of it is due to going through every single life stage together but then again there are times where that bond seems to go beyond environment. There was a sobering but very interesting documentary on identical twins called Three Identical Strangers, if you are interested in this type of stuff it's a good watch.
Your comment reminded me of the documentary "Three Identical Strangers" [1], about identical triplets adopted by different families during their first months of life who try to re-establish their connection when they meet later by chance. It's a gripping story with a shock ending. Somewhat relevant to this thread and I hope not too much of a spoiler, it's suggested in the film that they may have been affected by separation anxiety.
[1] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7664504/
The Guardian article the AI article seems to pull from is better, but aside from the links to Desperately Seeking Susan, I agree proof is limited. https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/nov/11/nature-or-nurture-debate-three-identical-strangers-film
That said, relying on web searches for research on the 80s doesn't work that well.
I believe this story, and particularly the documentary, "Three Identical Strangers", is fake. I watched it years ago and became increasingly suspicious.
The three triplets are often interviewed on 80's style talk shows, but the verisimilitude is simulated; there were no such shows. At one point they open a restaurant as business partners. This "iconic" restaurant seemed to never exist, except for one "closed" marker in google search with no other reviews, and one picture, which was a small screen shot -- from the "documentary".
I investigated a little further and found that one of the producers was a professor of media bias at a university. This article, which was probably written by AI, is regurgitation. I would be happy to be proven wrong and I challenge anyone to come forward with any evidence for the truth of this subject that comes from outside of the documentary itself.
I've just watched a documentary on Netflix, "Three Identical Strangers" (SPOILER ALERT), about a 1960's to 1980's study about identical twins/triplets separated at birth and who grew up in intentionally distinct conditions (of the triplets, one grew up in a blue collar family, one in middle class, and one in a upper class family, all with an older sibling in the family as a sort of "control").
Apparently, the study ran for decades, but the results were never published... it's unclear why but it seems plausible to me that, aside from the ethical concerns, the study came to uncomfortable conclusions about the polemic "nature VS nurture" debate. Initially, they show how all siblings in the study, despite the intentionally very different environments, all came to like and do the exact same things... but later in the documentary, it also shows there were differences enough that the similarities were only superficial (in what I can't see as anything other than trying to appease the "nurture" crowd - as there seems to be no justification for that, as much as I tried to find it in what was shown).
The documentary also mentions the study may even actually have been about the influence of different parenting styles on the children, or even about mental illness, given many of the participants in the study had biological parents who may have been mentally ill (who the hell would give up their children if they didn't have some serious mental issues?!), which again seems to point at trying to divert from the study findings in my opinion.
The documentary is a little sensationalistic as it tries to outrage the viewers instead of trying to understand the actual circumstances of the study (siblings were always separated at birth at the time in most adoption agencies, apparently, that was not the fault of the study), which is a pity but understandable as that makes for better entertainment which is what Netflix really needs for its viewers to be happy, but still it's well worth a watch.
These articles talk a little bit about the controversies:
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2208369-three-identical-strangers-was-the-twin-separation-study-ethical/
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/nov/11/nature-or-nurture-debate-three-identical-strangers-film
Here is a list of 20 documentaries I have come to love and return to when I come across them. There is no specific order to them. Enjoy! The * next to the number indicates the last 4 years. If you have seen one listed that you'd like to share what you think about please leave a comment with this structure [# in the list ] Comment... . i.e. [1] Loved learning about Noyce. What a guy.
1. Silicon Valley: Where the Future | PBS: American Experience [1:23:19] [2013] History of the how Silicon Valley came to be. William Shockley. Robert Noyce. Fairchild Semiconductor, The Traitorous Eight. Homepage: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/silicon/ Kanopy: https://www.kanopy.com/en/product/122744 Where to Watch: https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/silicon-valley
2. Shenzhen: The Silicon Valley of Hardware | Wired UK: Future Cities [1:07:50] [2016] the evolution of “Shanzhai” – or copycat manufacturing – has transformed traditional models of business, distribution and innovation, and asks what the rest of the world can learn from this so-called “Silicon Valley of hardware". Youtube: https://youtu.be/SGJ5cZnoodY
*2.1. The People's Republic of The Future | Bloomberg: Hello World [30:10] [2019] Shenzhen, tech-fueled entrepreneurs try to navigate an authoritarian regime. Youtube: https://youtu.be/taZJblMAuko
3. The Pirate Bay Away From Keyboard | TPB AFK [1:22:07] [2013] The history of the Pirate Bay. Torrenting. Legal. Privacy. Homepage: https://tpbafk.tv Youtube: https://youtu.be/eTOKXCEwo_8 Where to Watch: https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/the-pirate-bay-away-from-keyboard
4. Can’t Get You Out of My Head | BBC [6 Part] [2021] Adam Curtis takes you on "An Emotional history of how we got to this place." Economics. History. Power. Psychology. World. China. Russia. UK. USA. Part 1: Bloodshed on Wolf Mountain [1:14:15] Part 2: Shooting and F*king are the Same Thing [1:14:01] Part 3: Money Changes Everything [1:10:36] Part 4: But What If the People Are Stupid? [1:13:29] Part 5: The Lordly Ones [1:05:43] Part 6: Are We Pigeon? Or Are We Dancer? [1:59:50] Homepage: https://www.bbc.com/bbcfilm/films/cant-get-you-out-of-my-head/ BBC iPlayer: https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/p093wp6h/cant-get-you-out-of-my-head Thought Maybe: https://thoughtmaybe.com/cant-get-you-out-of-my-head/
5. Three Identical Strangers | NEON [1:37:00] [2018] Its in the name, but The less you know about this story the better. Homepage: https://www.threeidenticalstrangers.com Kanopy: https://www.kanopy.com/en/product/11374410 Where to Watch: https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/three-identical-strangers
6. The Pharmacist | Netflix [4 Part] [2020] A small-town pharmacist investigates the death of his son in a drug deal, but his investigation skills only expands when OxyContin becomes available. Part 1: Justice for Danny [1:00:38] Part 2: A Mission from God [58:47] Part 3: Dope Dealers with White Lab Coats [47:30] Part 4: Tunnel of Hope [48:31] Homepage: https://thecinemart.com/the-pharmacist.html Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/title/81002576 Where to Watch: https://www.justwatch.com/us/tv-show/the-pharmacist
7. AlphaGo | Netflix [1:30:27] [2017] Deepmind, Alphabets's AI company, creates an AI to play the game Go and faces off to beat the best, Lee Sedol. Homepage: https://www.alphagomovie.com Youtube: https://youtu.be/WXuK6gekU1Y Where to Watch: https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/alphago
8. Page One: Inside the New York Times | Magnolia Pictures [1:31:38] [2011] As print media begins to be challenged by the internet, you get an inside look into NY Times. Homepage: http://www.magpictures.com/pageone/ Where to Watch: https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/page-one-inside-the-new-york-times
9. The Secret of Tuxedo Park | PBS: American Experience [53:00] [2018] Alfred Lee Loomis isn't just a Wall Street tycoon, but a scientist with a checkbook to pay for it. Opening his home to the best, he follows his interest and a call from the government about WWII. Homepage: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/secret-tuxedo-park/
10. The Century of the Self | BBC [4 Part] [2002] Adam Curtis investigates how Freudian theory influenced twentieth century society. Part 1: Happiness Machines [58:32] Part 2: The Engineering of Consent [58:40] Part 3: There is a Policeman Inside All Our Heads, He Must Be Destroyed [58:39] Part 4: Eight People Sipping Wine in Kettering [59:32] Homepage: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00ghx6g BBC iPlayer: https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/p00ghx6g/the-century-of-the-self Thought Maybe: https://thoughtmaybe.com/the-century-of-the-self/
11. How Ants Can Make The Internet a Safer Place | Tom Mishra [00:04:08] [2015] Five researchers, scientists and mathematicians studied the behavior of Ants and Game Theory to create a safer Internet. Video: https://vimeo.com/147548221
12. Chasing Einstein | Ignite [1:22:00] [2019] Follows leading scientists around the world, from the largest particle accelerator at CERN in Switzerland to the LIGO gravitational wave detector in the US to find out whether Einstein's theory of gravity can stand the test of time. Homepage: https://chasingeinsteinfilm.com Where to Watch: https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/chasing-einstein
13. Language of Love (Ur kärlekens språk) | [1:43:00] [1969] * Rated X, and in Swedish A panel of real-life doctors discuss sexual hangups, misconceptions, personal prejudices and the ignorance of individuals when it comes to matters sexual. Where to Watch: https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/language-of-love
14. Citizenfour | TWC [1:54:00] [2014] A documentarian and a reporter travel to Hong Kong to meet Edward Snowden where they release classified information. Homepage: https://citizenfourfilm.com Where to Watch: https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/citizen-four
15. Abacus: Small Enough to Jail | PBS: Frontline [1:30:00] [2016] The Chinese immigrant Sung family, owners of Abacus Federal Savings of Chinatown, New York is targeted by the DA in the mess after the 2008 financial crisis. Homepage: https://www.abacusmovie.com Kanopy: https://www.kanopy.com/en/product/2141966 Where to Watch: https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/abacus-small-enough-to-jail
16. Zero Days | Magnolia Pictures [1:56:00] [2016] Stuxnet, a self-replicating computer virus discovered in 2010 by international IT experts points to be created by the NSA and used by Unit 8200, Israel, on Iran nuclear enrichment facility. Homepage: http://www.zerodaysfilm.com Kanopy: https://www.kanopy.com/en/product/10846994 Where to Watch: https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/zero-days
17. Tell Me Who I Am | Netflix [1:25:32] [2019] The less you know about this story the better. Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/title/80214706 Where to Watch: https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/tell-me-who-i-am
18. McMillions | HBO [6 Part] [2020] A detailed account of the McDonald's Monopoly game scam during the 1990s. Part 1: Episode 1 [55:50] Part 2: Episode 2 [53:57] Part 3: Episode 3 [56:54] Part 4: Episode 4 [57:08] Part 5: Episode 5 [56:41] Part 6: Episode 6 [56:59] HBO: https://www.hbo.com/mc-millions Where to Watch: https://www.justwatch.com/us/tv-show/mcmillion
19. Jesus Camp | Magnolia Pictures [1:24:00] [2006] Children at a christian summer camp as they hone their "prophetic gifts" and are schooled in how to "take back America for christ." The film is a first-ever look into an intense training ground that recruits born-again christian children to become an active part of America's political future. Kanopy: https://www.kanopy.com/en/product/10803148 Where to Watch: https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/jesus-camp
*20. The Edge of All We Know | Netflix [1:39:00] [2020] Follow the quest to understand the most mysterious objects in the universe, black holes. Homepage: https://www.blackholefilm.com Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/title/81343342 Where to Watch: https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/black-holes-the-edge-of-all-we-know
Three Identical Strangers - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Identical_Strangers A documentary about set of identical triplet brothers adopted as infants by separate families ... with a twist.
Denmark has a difficult relationship with the US
An extraordinary Danish Radio report exposed how scores of children in Denmark, many of them orphans, were subject to CIA-funded experiments for at least two decades.
The purpose of these activities remains unknown, as authorities continue to actively suppress the truth of what happened in the 1960s and early 1970s.
The startling exposé is based on the work of documentarian Per Wennick, who was one of 311 participants in the mysterious trials. The children never learned the objective of the tortuous assessments to which they were exposed, even after they ended.
According to Wennick, when he was 11 years old, he was asked at an authoritarian orphanage in Copenhagen if he wanted to try something “fun” at the local municipal hospital. It was vaguely described as an examination of how children “feel”. Believing it would be a welcome diversion, he acquiesced and even received a small sum for his participation.
Wennick went on to undergo a series of regular tests, which included being forced to listen to recordings on headphones of loud noises, screams, and statements intended to scare him. Staff strapped him to a chair while electrodes were placed on his arms, legs, and chest, measuring his heart rate, temperature, and sweat levels.
These experiments continued until 1973, when Wennick was 24-years-old. However, a decade later, while in a hospital due to a skin complaint, he learned his visit—in fact, his every contact with healthcare services— was reported to the Danish Psychological Institute for reasons never made clear to him.
Fast forward to 2018. While at a film festival in the United States, he saw the documentary "Three Identical Strangers," which tells the story of triplets deliberately separated at birth and offered up for adoption to families of differing socioeconomic backgrounds, in a covert and highly unethical scientific “nature versus nurture” study.
It occurred to Wennick he too may have been unwittingly caught up in a similar experiment.
Continued at https://thedissenter.org/cia-funded-experiments-on-danish-orphans-for-decades/
There's a great documentary called Three Identical Strangers. It follows three sets of identical twins who were separated at birth, and later reunited in adulthood. Watching it gives you a real sense that nature is practically the only thing that defines us. Worth a watch for anyone who found this article interesting.
Notably their genetics. These things tend to go together.
Furthermore children are likely adapted to be parented by their parents.
The "Three Identical Strangers" documentary on the twin study they buried over likely inconvenient conclusions could only hint at it. The triplet that came to a bad end had a parent very unlike themselves in disposition.
Adopted children also do not gain the full benefit of natural children of good parents.
Recently they found the negative effects of spanking is more related to genetics than the action itself. https://twitter.com/DegenRolf/status/1516070970624249857
In the nurture over nature debate, nurture will only ever continue to lose ground.
If you are really interested in this you need to watch the documentary Three Identical Strangers. It's amazing.
The documentary Three Identical Strangers also agrees with you, a fascinating account of triplets separated at birth to study parenting.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Identical_Strangers
I'm almost positive that Freud did NOT think that "early-childhood sexual fantasies" were the basis of illness, but early-childhood trauma as the culprit, and I've come to believe that is almost surely the case, although I am sure no one cares about my insights on the issue.
Not only does this line up squarely with my own personal experience with addiction and other psychosis I have, but the lack of these issues in my children as well, who had a radically different early childhood then I and have no addiction issues whatsoever.
Case in point...I recently saw the documentary about the triplets that were separated at birth and given to 3 different socio-economic and emotionally-connected parents and who, by total accident, met at college and came to be national celebrities in the 70's and 80's.
One of the three eventually killed himself, due in part I'm sure to his much deeper addiction issues then that of his 2 siblings. The interesting part was that he was given to the "wealthy, but emotionally distant" family.
By far the most well balanced and successful of the 3 was the one given to the gregarious and emotionally-connected father, who showered the child with love and support throughout his whole life.
I could go on for 30 minutes discussing all the takeaways of this documentary, called Three Identical Strangers...it turns out the children where all part of an ethically-questionable experiment where, in my mind at least, the end results basically proves that 95% of the nature/nurture argument goes to the "nature" side.
It seems that all "nurture" can do is fuck you up and give you lifelong issues that are incredibly difficult to overcome.
I recommend the documentary "Three Identical Strangers". Stay for the surprise ending.
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https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-three-identical-strangers-documentary-20180702-story.html
In 1995, after a struggle with mental illness, Galland committed suicide. That same year, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Lawrence Wright published an article in the New Yorker shedding light on a disturbing psychological study. The scientific inquiry, masterminded by prominent psychologist Dr. Peter Neubauer and his Child Development Center, set out to answer the fundamental question of nature vs. nurture. Through the now-defunct Louise Wise adoption agency, an unknown number of twins and triplets were placed in different homes and secretly observed for years by researchers who diligently made home visits. (Parents were told these visits were standard, to track the adoptive children’s progress.)
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I already said this to someone above but check out the documentary "Three Identical Strangers." It's both enjoyable and will give you some interesting food for thought as to the ethics of nature/nurture research.
You should watch the movie Three Identical Strangers. It's a documentary about triplets adopted into three different families.
Tangentially related is the recent documentary "Three Identical Strangers", triplets separated at birth who discover each other like you wouldn't believe.