Really Into Each Other
Director Michael Shanks takes the so-called messy relationship to new heights.
Together
Director: Michael Shanks • Writer: Michael Shanks
Starring: Alison Brie, Dave Franco, Damon Herriman
USA • 1hr 42mins
Opens Hong Kong August 7 • III
Grade: B
How attached is too attached to an intimate partner? How “into” them do any of us need to be? When is supportive simply codependent? Should both of you be able to calmly open a childproof pill bottle under duress? These are among the questions first-time filmmaker Michael Shanks asks in Together, the most sweetly romantic body horror nightmare you’re likely to see this year. Admittedly Coralie Fargeat really raised the bar for this kind of OTT gross-out in The Substance, but not since David Cronenberg’s The Fly has such a loving, if vaguely dysfunctional, couple been forced to contend with so much corporeal KY Jelly. Together is fun and freaky, if not the revelation Sundance would make it out to be. But that’s Sundance.
To address the elephant in the room, Shanks, and actor-producers Alison Brie and Dave Franco (among others) have been accused of plagiarism and actually sued over the film’s origins. That’s an issue for the WGA and the courts to decide. On its surface, Shanks has injected a rote drama about a long-term relationship navigating choppy waters with a healthy dose of metaphoric curses and gluey skin. The gluey skin is in good hands, as designer Larry Van Duynhoven is the same maniac (I say that with love and admiration) who supervised the practical effects for Relic and Bring Her Back. His work here a bit more judicious, wending around quick cuts and dark corners that give Brie and Franco (thankfully married in real life) room to make the central couple a recognisable and realistic one.
To hell with this ‘love’ shit
That’s important, because if you don’t believe the dynamic between struggling musician Tim (Franco, just the other side of frantic) and schoolteacher Millie (Brie) the horror and the comedy both collapse. Tim is still mourning the shocking death of his parents and moping around, failing at being the rock star he aspires to be. So the pair decides a change of pace is needed and off they move to a small town in the middle of nowhere Washington (played by Melbourne) where Millie takes a job at a small country school and becomes the primary breadwinner. They’re fairly isolated from the world – and from each other, particularly following an awkward marriage proposal that went bust. The only person they really hang out with is Millie’s fellow teacher Jamie (the eternally welcome Damon Herriman, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Better Man), who points out a bunch of great hiking trails in the area. So one day Tim and Millie go for a forest walk, fall into a cave, and have a run in with some goo that sends them out very, very different people.
It’s the petty arguments, snappy retorts and passive aggressive needling mixed in with genuine affection that bring Tim and Millie to life as a couple on the skids. They haven’t had sex in months. Millie tries to be patient and supportive but she’s reaching a breaking point. Tim wants to be more engaged for her but he’s feeling emotionally crippled, a feeling not helped by the arrival of the charming and adjusted Jamie. Of course, it’s the tension between them that gives the mysterious goo they found in the cave that much more impact. For some reason, it literally binds them together – mentally and physically – and sends them spiralling, often comically so. Tim and Millie isn’t a will-they-or-won’t-they couple. They’re a should-they-or-shouldn’t-they one. The goo leads to nasty “Get your hair out of my mouth” moments, impromptu surgery and one of the gawdawfulest sexual trysts in history. As a start.
Together is a delightfully squicky body horror comedy that works for the vast majority of its efficient run time, but Shanks doesn’t quite stick the landing. That isn’t unusual in first films, and it’s only a few short minutes that clang. The problem is those few short minutes are head-scratchers that really muddy the waters the film glided through for the previous 100. It’s one of those endings that makes you go, “Oh, I thought this movie was about something else.” Hey, reading a film is, with occasional cudgel-wielding exceptions, subjective and open to interpretation like any art. But Shanks tosses a spanner into the works so late in the proceedings it’s just messy and if I’m honest a little bit distracting. You might sit there recalling what you just saw and wondering what you missed. And the big third act reveal will be a surprise to anyone… who’s never seen a movie before. Seriously though, these are minor quibbles in an otherwise enjoyably twisted metaphor for the psychological lens we now view all relationships through. Who knows? Maybe Shanks does stick the landing. How each of us perceives the closing shots probably says more about us than we’d like to admit.