Incarceration, focalization and narration: Adapting the two selves in ‘Boys and Girls’1

Criticism on Alice Munro has neglected many adaptations of her writing. This article offers a corrective by examining Don McBrearty’s 25-minute short film ‘Boys and Girls’ (1983), based on the story of the same title. In this article, I explore how Munro’s treatment of metanarration and her preoccupation with issues of perspective – as revealed, for instance, by the story’s gestures towards its being focalized from the perspective of an unnamed, first-person narrator and that it is relayed to us in retrospect – are imbricated in the narrative structure of McBrearty’s adaptation. I begin by exploring Munro’s concerns about narration and gender before examining McBrearty’s project and analysing how it not only replicates but also offers a fresh perspective on the short story.