In her first documentary, Céline Dion is ready to not only talk about her current reality of living with stiff person syndrome, but also show fans herself at her worst.
But there's one scene in the new Prime Video documentary I Am: Celine Dion that has left fans unsettled and upset. The touching movie chronicles the months after Dion had to cancel a Las Vegas residency due to her ailing health, including archival footage of the legend's rise to icon status and a candid insight into her illness, which she's been living with for more than a decade.
Towards the end of the film, Dion experiences a seizure and most of the attack plays out on screen.
Watch the trailer for I Am: Céline Dion. Post continues after video.
The entire sequence is extremely confronting the viewers. The seizure happens when Dion returns from the studio after laying down a track for the rom-com featuring her music, Love Again.
What should be a moment of joy for the star quickly turns.
Dion is with her health therapist when she starts feeling a muscle spasm. From there, suddenly she becomes paralysed, hunched over, tears streaming down her cheeks, and she wails in pain as emergency workers file into the room.
The whole scene lasts for an excruciatingly long five minutes and is a stark reminder of the hit-maker's reality living with SPS. Eventually, the singer regains control of her body and sits in shock.
In a recent interview with Variety, the documentary's director, Irene Taylor, shared she was hesitant about including the "intensely revealing" scene, but Dion insisted on keeping it in.
"I would have [cut it out] if she asked, because she was only semi-conscious when this happened," Taylor said.
"The very first thing she said was, 'I think this film can help me.' I think she meant a lot of things by that... And then she said, 'And I don't want you to cut out that scene, and don't cut it down.' And by 'that scene', we knew what she meant."
The director admitted she felt unsure as to whether she should keep the cameras rolling throughout the seizure.
"I realised, I don't know what we're gonna do with this footage, but I'm just gonna keep filming, cause I've been filming with Céline for eight months, and not only has she never asked me to stop filming, she specifically told me, 'Do not ask my permission, just do it,'" said Taylor.
"So I just did my job in that regard. But the human part of me was very uncomfortable."
Taylor went on to admit that she flagged a few moments in the movie with the singer that could've been dropped, but Dion stayed firm.
"I was like, 'Well, what about that part where you're crying and they're putting something up your [nose]?" she recalled. "She said, 'It's okay. I told you, I don't want you to cut it. That's what I go through. That's what this feels like.'"
The singer told Vogue earlier this month that she promised the film would show her fans the "full truth" of her current life, and it's this decision that drew her to Taylor as a director.
"I wasn't looking for someone who would dramatise my life or reinvent what I was going through. Or someone who would always be saying, 'Can we ask you that? Can we go there?' When I met Irene, I knew right away that she was the person," she said.
"I did allow Irene to capture things that maybe will be hard for some people to see, but it's my reality."
Feature image: Prime Video.