New and different enough to fascinate me even though I’m pretty neutral on Michael J. Fox.

I was in eighth grade and my family was going through our big People Magazine phase when Michael J. Fox went public with his Parkinson’s disease diagnosis, so I was already familiar with his story. Twenty-five years of disease progression has made the arc even more interesting, and Michael himself more willing to excavate the emotional nooks and crannies of his life.

I had heard about how the director spliced in pertinent scenes from Michael J. Fox’s old movies and shows. I thought I would hate this (I dislike obvious reenactments) but it worked surprisingly well. And the few actual reenactments were expertly folded into the narrative. The documentary did feel more obviously scripted than most until I realized why: much of the narration comes directly from Michael’s book.

The movie and television scenes are a fun device, but this documentary succeeds where it lets Michael speak for himself. They could have skipped all the production and editing and I still would have enjoyed just watching the raw (and it is raw) interview footage.

Whether you’re a fan or not his story is interesting enough to hold its own and I enjoyed this documentary.