Me and You and Personal Desire
On Wednesday I started a new job. After an extended bout of time off, adjusting the body clock to full time employment has been harder than expected. It was within this strange world of semi-coherence that I was dragged to see Miranda July's Me and You and Everyone We Know last night.
The film is for the most part a genuine original, the structured mushings of conceptual artist July, who also appears in the film as its romantic lead. July has described her film as inspired by "the longing I carried around as a child, longing for the future, for someone to find me, for magic to descend upon my life and transform everything." Her characters are all somewhat isolated from each other, and they seem to be in a constant state of silent commentary on their small existences. The half-living, half-dream state in which the characters interact was a point of connection for me as I sat in the cinema in my half-lived, half-dream state, and suddenly I felt like I was watching, and participating in, a Milan Kundera novel.
Desire is integral to the human psyche. Living in a western capitalist democracy desire is perpetually programmed into us by advertising, the media, and manipulative rodent politicians. Yet desire - non commercialised and packaged desire - can be a good thing. You and Me and Everyone We Know is about a very personal desire - the desire for things that will probably never happen. I'm not sure I've seen a film that uses that personal space as a point of departure for a story, but this film does: in the discordant romance between a shoe salesman (John Hawkes) and a cab driver for elderly people (July), in the pubescent silence of teenage Peter (Miles Thompson), in the comatose body language of art curator and online "romantic" Nancy (Tracy Wright), in the hope chest of a mature little girl (Carlie Westerman), or in the tap of a coin against a sign post by a young black child (Brandon Ratcliff, who steals the movie).
Fantasy or no fantasy, I was genuinely moved by the film and look forward to more from Miranda July.
The film is for the most part a genuine original, the structured mushings of conceptual artist July, who also appears in the film as its romantic lead. July has described her film as inspired by "the longing I carried around as a child, longing for the future, for someone to find me, for magic to descend upon my life and transform everything." Her characters are all somewhat isolated from each other, and they seem to be in a constant state of silent commentary on their small existences. The half-living, half-dream state in which the characters interact was a point of connection for me as I sat in the cinema in my half-lived, half-dream state, and suddenly I felt like I was watching, and participating in, a Milan Kundera novel.
Desire is integral to the human psyche. Living in a western capitalist democracy desire is perpetually programmed into us by advertising, the media, and manipulative rodent politicians. Yet desire - non commercialised and packaged desire - can be a good thing. You and Me and Everyone We Know is about a very personal desire - the desire for things that will probably never happen. I'm not sure I've seen a film that uses that personal space as a point of departure for a story, but this film does: in the discordant romance between a shoe salesman (John Hawkes) and a cab driver for elderly people (July), in the pubescent silence of teenage Peter (Miles Thompson), in the comatose body language of art curator and online "romantic" Nancy (Tracy Wright), in the hope chest of a mature little girl (Carlie Westerman), or in the tap of a coin against a sign post by a young black child (Brandon Ratcliff, who steals the movie).
Fantasy or no fantasy, I was genuinely moved by the film and look forward to more from Miranda July.
posted by Damien at 4:50 pm
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