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Joining us today to be together with us is Vulture TV critic Roxana Haddadi.
Hey, Roxana.
Hey, guys.
Thank you for having me.
Absolutely.
And we're not, none of us are going to be together like this movie means it.
So Together, written and directed by Michael Shanks, is about Millie and Tim, played by Alison Brie and Dave Franco.
They are long term partners who move to a house in the country.
Very nice house, by the way.
Yes.
On a hike.
They stumble literally on an underground cave and by the time they get out, a very unsettling process has already begun.
It seems they are being physically pulled together, their bodies starting to stick to each other.
And that is just the beginning.
The story is not for the squeamish.
Together is in theaters now.
Aisha, I'm going to start with you.
Talk to me about Together.
It was fun.
I kind of enjoyed it.
As someone who herself has been in a long-term relationship, I think some of the ideas that this movie is positing around what it means to be in a relationship and how you know you go from being I I, I to we we we, very quickly.
And that can be very scary.
And you look around, you're like, what's happening?
I think that seeing Dave Franco and Alison Brie sort of play this out, knowing that they are a, and seeing them sort of play this version of a relationship out, is very interesting.
It's fun and I think they have really good chemistry.
And a lot of cringy moments happen in the first few minutes of this movie that, like I would never wish upon anyone public moments and proposals and I feel like it gets that dynamic right.
And once it gets into the body horror aspect, I think it's a very visceral movie.
And I liked that.
But yeah, overall, I had a lot of fun with this movie.
And I'm sure we'll get into sort of where I think it kind of Didn't exactly stick the landing.
But I had fun and I think a lot of people probably will too.
Yeah.
What'd you think, Roxanna?
I think I'm slightly less positive overall, but I'm very pro the relationship stuff.
Like when this is like marriage story, I was very into it.
Yes.
And that I think it gets a lot of the like microaggressions of long term relationships right.
Like the little resentments that can build up over time with your partner and like.
The sacrifices you perceive you have made for them, the sacrifices maybe they didn't make for you.
All of that mess, I think, is very sharply observed and acted very well between the two of them.
I think the body horror is gross in a good way.
That's like a pro for me.
Yeah.
But I don't know that the horror idea feels like as well developed as it could have been.
And we're not going to get into spoilers necessarily.
But I do think it's a movie that sort of just ends rather than having like a real resolution of like its central horror conceit.
Yeah.
So like I'm fairly mixed, I think.
Yeah, I'm a little bit mixed too for I think some of the same reasons.
I really like how they sort of assert this metaphor, which is so blunt that it is barely a metaphor.
But you know this idea that the fusing of their bodies is, you know a stand in for the fact that in a relationship, you know you're sort of always concerned about merging your identity with someone else's, and all of that.
I'm not sure that they kind of have anything to say about this, other than that this dynamic exists and people are nervous about it.
I kept waiting for the moment.
That sometimes happens in my favorite scary movies or horror movies where you kind of go like oh, I see where they're going with this right.
There was nothing in it that really kind of felt surprising to me or anything like that.
But I do agree with Aisha.
I think a lot of the effects are really good.
Certainly the body horror is gross.
Yes.
Particularly with her.
The effects of how they indicate that her body is being pulled against her will, I think, are very interesting at times and very kind of balletic and cool looking.
Had a lot of respect for that.
And I do think, like a lot of times in a movie, like the people either both of them or one of them is so great that it doesn't really seem plausible, that they have serious doubts about the relationship.
But both of these people.
I kind of understand how they would get on your nerves and I kind of understand how you might decide not to end up with them.
Both of them.
And Both of them relatively equally in some ways just in different, like it plays out differently but kind of to the same degree.
They're not that good at being in this relationship a lot of the time.
So I liked that.
It's always difficult when you get a relationship where it's like oh, we're all really nervous about how things are going to go.
But it's like very clear that either you have one great person and one jerk, or you have a couple of perfect people who are destined to figure it out.
Yeah.
I mean Dave Franco kind of.
His career has been very interesting to watch, especially just because you know he started off as the younger brother of James Franco.
And the sort of afterthoughts.
And he was usually playing a dirtbag.
Like, he's got that voice.
It needles you.
I think for some people, they will find that incredibly irritating.
For me, it usually works.
It's not a typical leading man voice.
And I like that.
Right.
And he doesn't usually play a leading man.
He's usually a side character or he pops up like he popped up in the studio, playing a version of himself.
He's very funny in the studio.
Yes.
And he's truly in Love Lies Bleeding, the very fantastic, another great body horror movie.
Well, a much better body horror movie, I think.
But like.
He, in that movie, is playing an absolute terrible person.
There is no gray area.
He is horrible.
And I think it's interesting to see him here still playing a version of that character.
But he's not a villain.
And I think that this is kind of one of the best roles I've seen him in and the most sort of meatier roles that no pun intended, but like it does feel very like lived in in a way.
And I do wonder how much of that has to do with both of them actually being in a relationship together.
And it's like watching.
You know, I don't know Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt like you can't help putting that sort of aspect onto it.
And I wonder how much of that also affects the way we watch the movie.
At least for me, it's like impossible to forget that they are, you know, in real life, real couple.
And they've said in interviews like they actually couldn't imagine doing this with someone who wasn't, because it is such an intimate movie.
You have to be.
All body parts are at some point being fused together.
And by all, I mean all.
Yeah.
Probably the most effective use of fusing together is the scene that we're sort of alluding to a little bit.
But yeah, I mean, sex, it's sex.
Like you can imagine how for a couple.
We're NPR, but we can still, it's a thing.
Yeah.
And still acknowledge that this couple at one point is having sex, which is a problem.
If you're going to stick together and not be able to pull apart again.
It's going to come up in that context a little bit.
Yes.
But yeah, I do think that he, hers is not a bad performance.
She's great.
But I think he gets the more interesting character.
I think that's true.
Yeah, we get some of his backstory.
I mean, the backstory is very like Ari Aster influenced.
Yeah.
Like I think in an interview, Dave Franco talks about hereditary and it's like, oh, yeah, I get it.
You love hereditary.
I understand.
But his is sort of the like, more classic, like horror story backstory which I think was used really well.
Like all horror movies these days, you're doing a trauma thing, but the entire movie isn't about trauma, which I thought, at least, was like a nice little break from the rest of the genre at this point.
Yeah.
And I think the movie is not trying to draw too straight of a line between every single thing he does in this movie and And that trauma.
Mm-hmm. showing you exactly how they work together and i mentioned how really funny i think he is in the studio it was interesting to me i expected this to lean into the comedy of it a little bit more than it did there's sort of to me kind of one sequence that's kind of at the beginning of when they're sort of both coming to terms with what's happening where they suddenly seemed to me to lean more into the black comedy of it with some just straight up comedy beats in the way that the scenes are written.
And I really welcomed that.
I thought that was cool.
I was like, oh, I see.
So we're going into more of a comedic thing in this third act.
But then it kind of felt like they pulled back from that and there wasn't much more of that.
It's really only a couple of minutes in this scene with the two of them where they seem to be playing it as comedy.
And it's not that there's nothing else that's darkly funny in the entire movie.
But I kind of was there for this scene. kind of, it felt like a tonal shift to me.
And then it felt like they undid it.
And I was a little bit bummed because I also would have watched a version of this that played more into that, more directly.
I saw this at its premiere at Sundance earlier this year and that scene got a huge audience reaction.
And that to me was the highlight of the film.
It struck the right balance between body horror and and comedy and many comedies involve drugs.
And it involves drugs in a way that I think elevates that, the typical way that we see these things employed.
But I agree with you that once it pulls back from that and then, even though you know we're saying like the direct line is not like trauma trauma trauma, there is a way more sort of like pat way, that this film reveals why this is happening, where I was just like uh, like I again, this is not every, but a lot of horror movies of the last few years, including Ari Aster movies, feel like they are playing with the same.
Like this is the explanation, like this is what it is, and I'm like this is boring, And I think the problem with over explaining, which I think we all agree that the third act tends to do, is then it makes me think about all the other stuff you haven't explained.
So it's really just like it's a problem with the script where I'm like, oh, so I get it.
But now you've opened up this world that you've told me has a certain justification, but you're not justifying everything.
And a set of rules.
And then you go back and say, well, I don't feel like it did follow those rules all the time.
The thing that is sort of a bummer to me is that they start this film with a little prologue sequence in which you watch two dogs go into a cave, drink some water in the cave, come out and then fuse together into one like dog monster.
To me, there's no reason for that.
Just let me watch them go into the cave.
I basically know the conceit of the movie.
And what it reminds me of is all the TV shows that like, start with a dead body and then they're like six weeks earlier.
It's very law and order.
I think you could have just had them start to stick together and not explain why it's happening.
I think that would in some ways be more interesting, because it's how I think it feels to people sometimes in relationships like this is that it just one day you feel it happening and it's very unnerving.
I don't know why you couldn't just do it that way.
Well, this feels like classic first time director perspective problems, right.
Like michael shanks, this is his first feature film, so i give him a little bit of leeway of there was enough in this movie for me that shows promise, that like, oh for sure if he's gonna, you know, over explain sometimes, and i was less bothered by the prologue than i was, just by the way it ends.
But It's an absolutely valid criticism.
And at the same time, just like, oh, this is kind of what usually happens with first time films.
I will say one other point that I loved, but I can also see other people kind of bristling at or being like oh really, this is so obvious, is like at the end there is a musical cue that is both very on point and obvious.
But it worked on me and you know, your mileage may vary, that's all I'll say.
But excellent musical cue yeah, because if I said the artist, anyone who knows the artist would obviously know what the cue is and I think it's better as a surprise.
But it tickled me, it pleased me, I think that cue works.
I also think that, as much as I have issues with the prologue scene, I ultimately take it as like we wanted to do an homage to the thing.
And I guess I can't be too mad about anybody wanting to do an homage to the thing.
And I will say, great dog performances.
Those dogs really stared at each other in a very unsettling way.
Yeah, if those are real dogs, they did a great job.
They did great work.
And I think you're right Aisha, that it often takes confidence as a director not just confidence in yourself, but the confidence of the people you're making the movie for and with not to explain.
Right.
Yeah.
Like to be able to say, no, they're going to get it.
It's my decision and belief that they're going to get it.
You have to kind of maybe get a little bit farther into your career before that's going to work as well.
But like I feel like I'm coming off like I didn't like this movie.
And I did.
I will say I wore a baseball cap to this movie and I pulled it down over my eyes.
I was looking away a lot during this.
At certain moments I was like, oh no, not gonna look.
It does have jump scares, it does have some really scary stuff in it and some gross stuff in it.
I recommend like, just bring a baseball cap and you can kind of pull it down low and then you can kind of see the bottom of the screen and like, if you're overwhelmed Overwhelmed, you can just stay under there and then you can just kind of peek out a little bit.
I think the people down the row from me thought I was a very strange person, but sometimes that's what I need with horror movies.
It's not that there's no blood in it, but like it's not because it's bloody.
It's just gross.
It's just gross.
It's just the way that I talk about body horror sometimes is I'm like, what is the goop factor?
And the goop factor is very high on this film.
And the squelching factor.
Yeah.
The sound design is really good.
Yeah.
Like there's so many of these nowadays where the CGI effects are not working and it's just.
This doesn't feel real.
And I don't know how much of this is CGI versus practical effects, but you will feel this movie.
And even though it was a lot.
I welcome anything that feels real, even if it's very gross.
It is gross.
Okay.
Tell us what you think about Together.
Find us on Facebook at facebookcom slash pchh.
And on Letterboxd at letterboxdcom slash nprpopculture.
We'll have a link in our episode description.
That brings us to the end of our show.
Roxanne Haddadi, Aisha Harris, thank you so much for being here.
Talking to you is never gross.
Thank you, Linda.
Thank you.
This episode is produced by Carly Rubin, Janae Morris, Liz Metzger and Mike Katzeff and edited by our showrunner, Jessica Reedy.
Hello, Come In provides our theme music.
Thanks for listening to Pop Culture Happy Hour from NPR.
I'm Linda Holmes, and we'll see you all next time.
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