Everything Everywhere All at Once

That's how you put together a rock, a Ratatouille, and the long arm of the tax authority, and you get something between Don’t Look Back, Rick and Morty and Big Trouble in Little China. By all logic, it should be a disparate hodgepodge of half-baked ideas, allusions to anything, originality at all costs, and stupidity². All this in charge of someone who happened to have a solid budget and an impressive ensemble, but no producer to hold the reins. And that's what it is. However unlikely it may be (or maybe we are happy that it worked in spite of everything), it is, worlds wonder, a cohesive and tightly grasped whole, which is undeserving of only a slightly overblown runtime. Thanks to confident direction, and the aforementioned perfect cast, it handily manages to throw up one bizarre scene after another, as well as wringing out emotions in a brilliantly effective "family members finding their way to themselves and each other" equation throughout. (23/07/2022)

What happens when you mix some of Marvel's stinking failed comic book movies with a bit of The Matrix, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, an attempt at a revolutionary depiction of a story about family values (not) fulfilling their potential and totally WTF (read modern) pop culture moments? An absolutely frenetic travesty, where nobody knows what will happen in five minutes, but at the same time nobody really cares. (10/03/2023)

Watching this movie felt like downing two meatloaves, half a kilo of pork belly, and washing it down with a gallon of beer. It’s an overload for the senses — a kind of film-induced sensory overload. The entire time, I felt like I was losing my mind. I kept trying to make sense of what I was seeing, searching for some logical thread or anchor point to guide me through the story. Spoiler: I didn’t find it. Yet, for over two hours, I was completely fascinated. The plot stretches logic to its breaking point, and the editing seamlessly blends views from different dimensions into single shots. The performances are incredible: Ke Huy Quan channels a young Jackie Chan, Michelle Yeoh plays everything from a depressed family member to a kung-fu master with a pinky strong as steel, and Jamie Lee Curtis delivers a performance that’s one big WTF. In fact, the whole film is one big WTF. If it sweeps the Oscars, I wouldn’t be surprised, and I’d actually be happy for it. (15/02/2023)

Unfortunately for me, this highly anticipated film, which I was looking forward to as a potential movie of the year, crossed the line between quirky oddity full of playful ideas and disorganized mess where nothing matters, and not only once. While it always sort of gets back on the track and I was able to follow and enjoy it, I'm used to putting more focused films on a five-star pedestal, films where I can see the filmmakers have things firmly in their hands, and I simply didn't get that impression with Everything Everywhere All at Once, and not only because the finale completely missed me emotionally. The plot gradually gets into such a whirlwind, such a geyser of unlimited imagination, that it's really hard to find any fixed point – not necessarily "logical". Oh, and some of the jokes are trying so hard that it felt embarrassing a few times. I appreciate playfulness and originality, but I would have slowed down a gear or two. (20/05/2022)

The first two thirds are an example of first-class screenwriting, where unpredictable moments are strung together like on a treadmill and the rolling train of invention cannot be slowed down. I should be rightly impressed by Tohlle, unfortunately the Daniels as engineers on coke get so carried away that towards the end it becomes a poorly controlled propulsion vehicle that derails and smashes everyone in the wagon. It's a shame, because there's a whole sequence of scenes and situations that you've never seen in a movie before, and that's valuable. (30/01/2023)