Viscerally effective but narratively stretched beyond its limits, director Michael Shanks’ debut feature, Together, succeeds as a darkly funny look at codependency taken to outlandish extremes.
30-something couple Millie and Tim — played by real-life partners Alison Brie and Dave Franco — have been together for 10 years and can’t imagine not having the other in their life. Millie is enterprising and empathetic, and has just accepted a new teaching job at a small school away from the Big City. Tim has dreams of becoming a famous rockstar and quietly resents having to move far away from his bandmates and friends. When Millie proposes to Tim in front of their pals at their farewell party, Tim freezes in place, eventually accepting in a way that inspires little confidence about the future of their relationship. Tim is also carrying trauma regarding his recently deceased parents, and he doesn’t have a driver’s license; Millie drives him everywhere.
Tim and Millie claim to still love each other. Whether or not it’s “true love” or complacency is something that both remain agonizingly unwilling to address. Thus, regardless of any and all red flags, Millie and Tim move into their new (perhaps unrealistically nice and spacious) house in the forested countryside. The move-in goes smoothly enough — barring the rotting rats Tim finds above a light fixture and a friendly neighbor/new colleague at Millie’s school named Jamie (Damon Herriman), who seems to be hiding something.
While on a hike, Millie and Tim get lost during a rainstorm and fall into a spooky cave adorned with odd markings. They resolve to spend the night there, but, of course, haven’t brought enough water to share. Tim ends up drinking from a nearby pool that couldn’t be more ominous. After a psychedelic dream sequence, Tim wakes up to find that his and Millie’s thighs are stuck together. Weirded out, they’re able to peel apart without much difficulty.
Whatever substance Tim drank has profoundly changed the energy between him and Millie, though. He’s pulled towards her during seemingly random episodes, causing serious bodily harm along the way. Millie is freaked out by Tim’s behavior, blaming it on his mental illness and their lack of intimacy, while Tim insists that something more nefarious is going on. As the “force” increases its power and takes hold of Millie, the couple must decouple before it’s too late.
The stage is set for contortion-heavy body horror, with a healthy sprinkling of dark humor and genre tropes. Thanks to Brie and Franco’s convincingly lived-in performances and some go-for-broke set-pieces, Together hits more than it misses on a moment-to-moment basis, even if Shanks’ film often feels attached to extraneous pieces that muddle the cautionary tale at its core.
Brie and Franco’s chemistry and comedic timing is stellar. Tensions bubble, yet Tim and Millie still hold onto each other, flirty quips and all, unwilling to let go — each new “fusion” making it harder to separate emotionally as well as physically. Franco brings suitably pathetic and damaged energy as Tim struggles to cope and communicate the strange happenings to Millie and others around him, growing increasingly desperate to find answers. Brie, in a more subtle performance, brings pathos through Millie’s skepticism, frustration, and eventual determination to figure out what’s going on, taking charge while remaining vulnerable to the pull of her heart.
But Together isn’t aiming to be a high-minded relationship drama. Like The Substance before it, Together walks a tightrope between the comedic and grotesque. There are some sequences — like gnarly use of “Chekhov’s reciprocating saw” — that seem prime for audience reactions, and it’s nasty fun watching them play out on the big screen in a packed theater. Brie and Franco wholly commit themselves to the largely practical stunt work. Bone-crunching imagery turns into slapstick comedy that Shanks and cinematographer Germain McMicking frame with cringe-inducing flair.
Shanks has a keen sense for disturbing, sometimes frightening visuals and well-placed jump scares, but he slides into frustrating contemporary cinema traps.
While the central metaphor works well enough, Together brings in a third-act revelation that cuts narrative corners for the sake of convenience and “mainstream” over-explanation. Additionally, Tim’s backstory is awkwardly implemented, turning into a rather crass metaphor for the ways in which he ignores what needs to be addressed in his relationship with Millie and with himself.
These subplots seem unnecessary for a story that, in its delightful torturing of its lead characters, sends them down a path where they pay the price for their loss of individuality, or, from another angle, finally embrace what they can create as a unit. If only the film explored Tim and Millie’s bond with more complexity and focus beforehand, rather than finally painting their story into a corner.
Together still carries crowd-pleasing appeal, although its merits on being “the perfect date night movie” are up for debate; the film actually reinforces my own appreciation of being single. We can all probably agree, however, on that love scene being one for the history books.
REVIEW SCORE: 3.5/5
