Quick takes on Everything Everywhere All at Once and other films

At first, I thought The Worst Person in the World was a coming-of-age film for the new generation. There’s been a few of these in the last 20 years, about a person approaching 30 who is taking longer to find their aim in life than most did in prior generations, but this film turned out to be a lot more than that. Julie is a bright college student who doesn’t know what she wants in life. She bounces between majors like she bounces between lovers. Eventually she settles for working in a bookstore, and lands with her latest beau, Aksel. Askel is in his mid-40s and initially tries to warn Julie off, saying they are at different points in their life (he has a successful career as a comic book artist and is ready for a family, whereas she’s still figuring it all out) but Julie doesn’t listen and falls hard for him. However, a chance encounter with a man named Eivind at a party, and then seeing him again a couple years later, has her ready to bounce from Aksel onto the next “new” thing. At the breakup, Aksel tries to tell Julie that he’s been around and knows what they have is special, but the spontaneous Julie doesn’t listen. Eivind is good to her, but Julie may come to realize what she gave up. For a romcom, it’s light on comedy but heavy on the drama, and there are some fantastically emotional scenes. I’ve seen just one other film from director Joachim Trier (Louder than Bombs), but I’m thinking I need to check more out. ★★★★½

Everything Everywhere All at Once, for me, is one of those movies that shakes up what you expect from a film, because it hits on so many levels and checks off everything you’d want. It takes the considerable talents of Michelle Yeoh and lets her show her stuff. Evelyn is a Chinese-American woman who ran away with a young man years ago, leaving her parents in China and coming to America to open a laundromat. Unfortunately that business never paid off and now, 20 years later, the business is on the rocks, her husband Waymond is prepping to divorce her, and her daughter Joy will hardly give her the time of day. Evelyn goes a million miles an hour trying to keep everything floating when the unexpected happens. In an elevator on the way to the IRS regarding a problem on their audit, Waymond turns into someone else. Or I should say, he looks like Evelyn’s husband, but he has a completely different personality, and he quickly tells Evelyn that she is in danger. So begins a wild ride for the next 2 hours. Apparently an evil being known as Jobu Tupaki is intent on killing every Evelyn across every multiverse, and the Alpha Waymond has been jumping between multiverses to find an Evelyn who can stand up to her before getting killed. Might sound confusing, and I admittedly was in the beginning, but you catch on as the film goes, and it ends up being one of the most fun movies I’ve seen in a long time. Super funny, tons of drama, edge-of-your seat thrills, and, most surprisingly, extremely touching as well. In the special effects field, it’s hard to wow me these days, as it seems like everything’s been done, but this movie is completely fresh. I remember watching The Matrix in 1999 and feeling like that movie was so ahead of its time, and I came away from Everything Everywhere All at Once with the same sense of having seen something that sets a new bar. ★★★★★

Usually the small indie films are rewarding, but every now and then I land on a dud. We’re All Going to the World’s Fair is the latest culprit. It’s from the viewpoint of a teen girl and the camera is mostly her computer’s cam, as she video blogs about her participation in the latest internet “game.” You are supposed to prick your finger, smear blood across the screen, and repeat the phrase of the movie’s title, and then sit back and watch what happens over the ensuing weeks. A quasi-horror film, we see Casey struggle with what is or is not happening around her, much of which can be attributed to just a girl fighting depression. In any case, her thoughts turn increasingly dark as the film goes along, which gets the notice of a man following her vlogs and gets worried for her condition. This “scary” movie is about as boring as they come. I don’t mind that it seems to have been filmed on a $100 budget, but you can at least speed up the pace a bit. Watching Casey ramble on with long pauses in between sentences doesn’t work. ★½

Good Luck to You Leo Grande is a very interesting movie, but I’m not sure how remarkable it is. It stars Emma Thompson as Nancy, a 60-something woman who’s longtime husband died 2 years ago. She’s also recently retired as a teacher at a religious high school. Those 2 events have made her think about things she’s never done in her life, and in particular, sexual experiences she’s never had. Her husband, the only man she’d ever been with, was very much a “wham bam thank you m’am” kind of lover; he did missionary and that’s it, and even the same way every time, with nothing else done in bed ever. To experience more of what’s out there, Nancy has hired a sex worker, Leo (Daryl McCormack), for a session in a hotel room. Leo is everything that Nancy is not: young, confident, and completely at ease in any situation. Nancy, a strong Type A personality, wants to plan everything, and at first wants to know more about Leo: what made him choose this job, what do his parents think, and how he can find an older lady like herself attractive enough to “keep it up” during sex. Leo, in fantastic shape and extremely good looking, gives all the right answers, but whenever Nancy isn’t looking, we see him glance in the mirror or become thoughtful, and we know something is going on under that exterior. Over the course of 3 meetups in the same hotel room, the two get to know each other, and Nancy is able to check off items from her sex wish list. There’s some graphic scenes near the end, and obviously a lot of frank talk about different sexual moves and experiences, so this ain’t your family drama, but it is eye-opening about the sex worker business, as well as finding beauty and confidence in yourself even as you age. There’s some good lessons in here even if the content will turn quite a few people away, but I’m not sure I’d ever watch it again. ★★★

Rise is the newest in the long tradition of Disney sports films with an uplifting story, and like many of them, it is based on a true story. It follows the Adetokunbo family as they leave Nigeria and start a new life in Greece. Illegal immigrants, they are under constant fear of being caught and sent back, a fear that grows as they birth a few boys, Thanasis, Giannis, and Kostas. The film’s focus transfers as the boys get older, and follows them more, especially the two eldest, as they become involved in basketball. Thanasis and Giannis both show talent enough to maybe play professionally one day, but their parents are weary that too much attention may get them all deported. Some of these Disney sports flicks I really like (Million Dollar Arm, Miracle, McFarland USA), but too often some of these films feel very rote, and that’s the trap Rise falls into. The acting is very uneven, and the story pauses at weird moments to keep hitting home the family’s predicament, and speeds up at other times. For instance, Giannis seemed to get awfully good, awfully fast. For you non-sports fans, he would grow up to become an NBA champion and two-time MVP of the league, so it was interesting to see where he came from, but the film unfortunately just isn’t very good. ★½

• TV series currently watching: Stranger Things (season 4)
• Book currently reading: Dragons of Spring Dawning by Weis & Hickman