SPILL FILM REVIEW: ANN WILSON – IN MY VOICE (FILM SCREENING AND Q&A WITH ANN WILSON AND DIRECTOR BARBARA HALL)

ANN WILSON – IN MY VOICE (FILM SCREENING AND Q&A WITH ANN WILSON AND DIRECTOR BARBARA HALL)

INDEPENDENT

MAY 11, 2026 (MAY 30, 2026 TORONTO SCREENING)

You might expect a documentary about Heart frontwoman Ann Wilson to be about what it was like to be a female rock musician in a misogynistic era. But it’s not. It’s a film about what it’s like to be Ann Wilson. In My Voice, directed by Barbara Hall, has smartly subverted many of the worn-out Behind The Music-style cliches usually found in “women in rock” documentaries, and in doing so, has spared Wilson the boring and sexist framing she’s often given.

With authorized documentaries, there’s an understanding that you’re getting one person’s side of the story, and the narrative will be shaped by this. Notably absent from the film was Ann’s sister and Heart bandmate Nancy Wilson, who declined to participate. But her absence meant that the film had to tell the story from a different angle than usual.

At one point she says, “We didn’t want to be the girlfriends of Robert Plant and Jimmy Page. We wanted to be Robert Plant and Jimmy Page,” inspiring several cheers and whoops from the audience. Director Hall has honoured this sentiment by refusing to pigeonhole Wilson as a “female musician” and simply celebrating her as a fantastic musician the same way Plant, Page, et al. are lauded.

Instead of retreading the usual stories associated with Wilson, which include  sexist marketing and body shaming, the documentary focuses on her tenacity towards her artistic vision and her single-minded devotion to her craft. Canadian audiences will appreciate the time spent exploring Heart’s early years in Vancouver and how Wilson’s songwriting was influenced by her experiences there and the response the band’s music got from Canadian fans.

Wilson also discusses mentoring younger musicians such as the late Chris Cornell of Soundgarden, and Chappell Roan (who frequently performs “Barracuda” live in concert). It’s clear that these artists revere her the same way she revered Led Zeppelin. This theme comes full circle when the film showcases Wilson’s rendition of “Stairway To Heaven” at the 2012 Kennedy Center Honors, a performance that brought her hero Robert Plant to tears.

At the Q&A portion afterwards, a fan asked Wilson how she managed to survive as a woman in a male-dominated industry and if she had any advice for women who were facing sexism. Wilson responded simply that she “just went ahead and did it,” and that her love for music was so strong that there was nothing that could stop her from achieving her goals. This statement nicely sums up the thesis of this rockmentary: no dirt and drama, just determination and drive.

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Background Photo Credit: Criss Cain