Film review: Together

Together, written and directed by Michael Shanks, is a film that goes exactly as you’d expect. Real-life couple Dave Franco and Allison Brie play fictional couple Tim and Millie. She is a school teacher with a defined path to her career, and he is still trying to make his musical career happen. Millie gets a job in the countryside, and Tim agrees to make the move with her, but the relationship is struggling. They’re not happy, Milllie complains about their dead bedroom, and Tim struggles to be excited about moving away from his community, putting a nail in his dream of being a rock star.

So obviously, the central focus of this film is that they’ll be afflicted by a situation forcing them to address their issues in the most horrific way.

In this case, it’s a mysterious cave that Tim and Millie accidentally discovered while walking through the forest. When two people drink water from the same well, their bodies start to physically merge into one. We know that from the prologue, where two dogs turn into a two-headed freak that would fit perfectly in The Thing. It starts slowly with legs glued together, but before they know it, their skin is melding, the arms reaching inside each other’s arms. They physically have to fight the literal magnetic attraction while they investigate why this is happening to them.

As concepts go, Together is a type of idea we can’t believe no one has had before. A couple having severe relationship problems to the point of disconnection, are cursed by a condition that makes their bodies melt together? It writes itself, really. But Shanks, making his directorial feature debut, doesn’t have the confidence to let the mystery breathe into the setup’s social and emotional commentary. A good part of this plot revolves around Tim and Millie investigating the source of this evil and how it may or may not be related to their neighbour Jamie (Australian actor Damon Harriman), a local cult, and the recent disappearance of another couple.

The crux, though, is that none of it is interesting or important to the film’s overall message. These plot-focused elements are too common in modern independent films, whereas they used to be the realm of conceptual big picture stories. Shanks shifts the focus away from the concept and his characters, to have them instead find a mystery and reason for their affliction, when the outcome and how it changes them is the emotional core of their story.

It’s hard not to think what Cronenberg (David or Brandon) would do with this idea. It reminds me of Roman Polanski’s Repulsion, where a young Catherine Deneuve plays a woman tormented by her own apartment in a representation of her own paranoia and isolation. The film doesn’t let go of its concept and forces us, the audience, to address its implications. Shanks falls down the easy slippery slope of expected American narrative progression when he had an idea that could’ve been explored through more exciting avenues.

And that’s disappointing, especially when visually he nails the style. The body horror moments are genuinely horrifying, even if the end is not as intelligent as Shanks thinks it is. Brie and Franco have, as expected for a happily married couple, pitch-perfect chemistry, even if Brie is leagues ahead of Franco in acting skills.

But by the end, Together is precisely what one expects to be. The irony is that his questions about relationship disconnection and commitment are left unanswered. I liked how Tim, at the start, is in his late 30s, still trying to live his pie-in-the-sky dream, while his partner is an established important element of society. There’s so much about male, middle-class millennial entitlement and its harmful side by way of toxic masculinity. The ideas are there, but they’re all neglected for a mystery that adds no value to the film. In a moment that highlights that dramatic problem, Tim, suffering from several instances of separation anxiety after neglecting his partner for so long, spends his time investigating social media and another disappearance in the area. Not as compelling as you’d think.

The road to mediocrity is paved with good intentions. Together saves face with some fun gnarly moments and an expectedly terrific performance by Brie (a sex scene where they both get “stuck” to each other in the school bathroom perfectly encapsulates all the good things the film has to offer). But I mean it when I say it could’ve been so much better if it had the guts.

Verdict: 3 out of 5
For couples with a sense of humour and people who think that The Substance needed more plot.