YouHeart I gave it a 7.5 out of 10

Chirphymium It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

Beulah Bram A film of deceptively outspoken contemporary relevance, this is cinema at its most alert, alarming and alive.

Janis One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

splodgeroonie It doesn't surprise me that this has a relatively low rating on IMDb but as usual this doesn't accurately reflect the quality and depth of an original work of art such as this. Some people watch movies to be entertained and some watch films to expose themselves to something that might challenge them and make them think. I can do both but if you ever find yourself in that latter group then I highly recommend that you watch this film. If you find yourself strictly relegated to the former group I'd suggest you don't waste your time.Original, innovative, raw and challenging. There is a depth of emotion and an unravelling sense of mystery here that pulled me in and kept me captivated for the length of the film. Not to mention kept me thinking for days afterwards. It also ended satisfyingly well which is what I find most movies incapable of doing.View with an open mind and I believe you will be rewarded. I highly recommend this film.

alyssabruce97 This film is yet another great thanks to Ellen's amazing performance. Throughout the film, you see Tracey fall in love, attempt to rebel, deal with the bullies and completely break down. Exactly what every other teen goes through. But being that I'm the same age as Tracey in the film, I honestly couldn't have delivered the role better even if I were experiencing this first hand! She came off to me as a truly honest and genuine person.It took me until the end but I realized the symbolism of growing up (another great quality about this film, making it so unique.) After she lost her virginity to Slim Twig's character, her little brother disappeared. Her little brother symbolized her innocence or her childhood. And the fact that she made her top priority finding her little brother showed responsibility. Overall I believe that though fragmented screen put my eyes to work, it was appropriate for the scatter-brained, emotionally unstable girl. Both Ellen Page and Slim Twig did a fantastic job and the symbolism made it even better. This is a truly unique film and I'd say it's easily in my personal top 5!

Imdbidia Tracey Berkowitz is a 15y.o. girl on a night bus, covered by a curtain shower, talking directly to you - nonsense. He memory is fragmented, chaotic, fancy, and on a loop. She has left home, is looking for her missing little brother Sonny and is in trouble.We are drawn into Tracey's chaotic mind and soul, but also towards her path of growth from child to woman, from fairy-tale worlds to harsh reality and acceptance of the self. This is a very interesting story about a teenager that is not pretty, cleaver or happy. Although this is a movie about teenagers, there is nothing sweet about it, as presents very hard topics: rape, bullying, loneliness, lack of self-esteem, confused self-image, delusional thoughts, insecurity, and mental trouble.Tracey's memory fragments and thoughts appear in mini-screens within the screen and on split-screen images, which show different angles of the same scene or different scenes altogether. The non-linear narrative is very challenging. Pay extra attention to the first 15-20 minutes of the film, because they are the most difficult and the ones that really give clues to understand many of the things that happen later on.The film is more complex, visually, at the beginning, when Tracey's mind and emotions are more confused, and becomes simpler and more linear at the same pace that Tracey's mind clears, to be completely linear at the end, when she accepts herself and the events related to Sonny. In other words, Tracey's troubled mind and emotions are directly linked to the way the movie is visually organized. The movie is also full of symbolic psychoanalytical elements, from the gender of Tracey's psychiatrist and the settings in which the consultation happens, to the appearance of different animals (a crow, a horse, and "a dog"), to the way the scenes have been patched and shown to the viewer.Ellen Page is fantastic, despite the dramatic demands of her character. She was 20 when the film was shot, but she is believable as a 15y.o. girl. That's not only her physique, is the great actress she is. The rest of the cast are OK in their respective roles: Ari Cohen and Erin McMurtry as Mr & Mrs Berkowitz; Zie Souwand as sweet Sonny; Toronto Songwriter and performer Slim Twigg as jerk Billy Zero, Julain Richings as Dr Heker, among others.A few important flaws ruined what could have been a great movie. The main idea is brilliant but, since we get mostly Tracey's subjective approach to reality, the rest of the characters are somewhat pointless and can't be trusted by the viewer; in fact they are just hinted. I did not like the end, not the way it ended, but how the end was presented and how we get there - what triggers Tracey's epiphany? That is so because the mood of the movie and, most importantly, its tempo were not the right ones.This is one of those movies that are a challenge for the viewers, that need of their full awareness and attention, that have a difficult knot to untie, but also one of those movies that can be interpreted in different ways and make your brain produce sparks. One of those movies that you get or you don't, nothing in between. To me, one of those movies that, the more I think about it, the more I want to watch again.Are you ready for it?

Roland E. Zwick If it's true, as Marshall McLuhan has suggested, that the medium is indeed the message, then "The Tracey Fragments" proves that theory in spades. This highly idiosyncratic work has as its focal point "Tracey Berkowitz - 15 - just another girl who hates herself" - a description that comes straight from the mouth of Ms. Berkowitz herself. Tracey is a deeply unhappy youngster who hates her (admittedly horrible) parents, is terrorized by all the "cool" kids in school for insufficient mammary-gland development, spends most of her nights riding the subway, hooks up with a psychotic lowlife who turns out to be a drug dealer, and searches for her little brother whom she's hypnotized into thinking he's a dog and who goes missing by a frozen river when she's supposed to be watching out for him. To help mitigate her misery, Tracey also dreams of having a relationship with a brooding "emo" bad boy at school and fantasizes that she is a famous, universally worshipped rock star.But it is not Tracey's story that is of primary interest here; rather it's the cut-and-paste film-making style director Bruce McDonald has employed to create a sense of fragmentation and dislocation in the viewer - intended, obviously, to mirror the highly chaotic and disordered nature of Tracey's world and life. With rare exceptions, the screen is occupied by as few as two and as many as a dozen shots at a time, often portraying the same sequence from slightly different angles or at slightly different moments in time, or portraying thematically related scenes simultaneously. The question inevitably arises, is the approach effective in what it's trying to accomplish or does it serve as a distancing device for those of us who are trying to enter into Tracey's mind and world. I imagine that different viewers will come to varying verdicts on that point.Personally, I appreciate what McDonald is trying to do here more than I admire it. "The Tracey Fragments," which Maureen Medved has adapted from her own novel, offers many probing insights into the subject of teenage angst, particularly as regards the tremendous pressure modern young people are put under to "measure up" and conform to some arbitrarily agreed-upon social standard. And "Juno"'s Ellen Page gives a stunning performance as the young woman caught in an ever-tightening web of self-hatred (this is, in many ways, the darker side of "Juno," and Page is much less mannered in this role).But, frankly, the movie probably would have been more moving and involving without all the migraine-inducing imagery which succeeds mainly in throwing us out of the story. In fact, there is only one scene in which the split screen technique actually serves a narrative purpose - and that is when Tracey is hiding behind a curtain while her drug-dealer friend is being savagely beaten by the irate boss to whom he owes money. Most of the rest of the time, the approach feels more like a gimmick designed to separate this film from the rest of the "distressed-teen indie" pack than an artistically viable choice in its own right.Still, if you can get past all the artiness and visual distraction, you might just find in "The Tracey Fragments" a thoughtful, sensitive and ineffably sad glimpse into a young woman's heart.