Performance artist Miranda July writes and directs her first feature film
Christine (Miranda July), part-time video artist, part-time elder care driver takes one of her clients shopping for shoes and spies the love of her life, the wide-eyed, newly separated, shoe salesman, Richard (John Hawkes, Deadwood). She knows nothing about his life, but, she is in love and determined in her quest of him, almost to the point of seeming like a stalker, a benign stalker.
Richard, still healing from many wounds, one self-inflicted (he purposely pours lighter fluid on his hand, lights it on fire and seems surprised that he is burning) and his emotional wounds. He is trying to start a new life without his wife, in a cramped apartment, with two sons, preteen Peter (Miles Thompson) and grade school age, Bobby (Brandon Radcliffe), both of whom are like strangers to him. They are silent in their anger and have shut him out of their lives. They prefer to connect and communicate with strangers in online chat rooms, playing the game of not being themselves, online, just like adults.
Young neighbor and school mate of Peter, Slyvie (the excellent Carlie Westerman) is obsessed with order and buying household items for her dowry. Her happiness comes from connecting with neatly ironed towel sets and the latest kitchen gadget, dreaming of her perfect future. She has connected with her soul mate and doesn’t know it.
Two, much too adult, fourteen year old neighbor girls, Heather (Natasha Slayton) and Rebecca (Najarra Townsend) find their connections by teasing Richard’s co-worker, Andrew (busy character actor Brad William Henke) to the point of where he leaves them explicit messages, taped to his living room window. In their quest to find out which one on them is better at fellatio, they capture and use a strangely detached Peter for their own version of a double-blind study. No doubt this scene will make some uncomfortable in its frank look at the activities of today’s sexually aware, but still naïve, youth.
All of these different narratives and more mix, match and intersect to tell an off-beat love story.
Miranda July’s film (awarded a special jury prize at Sundance and winner of the Camera d‘Or at Cannes) has all the elements of a sugary, sentimental movie, but when the search for love and human connection is filtered through her artist’s brain, she presents a brilliant and convincing story.
So much of what works in this film could have been a failure, in the wrong hands. For example, Christine’s aggressive pursuit of Richard. She lets us witness his fears of connecting to where both the audience and Christine knows she is on the right course not to give up. We want them together.
When young Bobby arranges and meets his online partner, with who he has been trading explicit, yet infantile messages, we should have our own fears for his safety, but, yet, again, July handles a young boy’s looking for maternal love in a touching and non-threatening way.
Being a performance artist, July parodies the contemporary art world , its nonsensical arts speak and its declarations of what is art and what isn’t with great wit and humor.
Me and You and Everyone We Know reminded me of how I feel after reading a great short story. I wanted more but was satisfied to continue to reflect on the characters and their lives. Miranda July’s small film has an emotional depth balanced with humor and honest insight.
Me and You and Everyone We Know (2005)
IFC Films
Rated R
Directed and Written by Miranda July
Starring Miranda July, John Hawkes, Miles Thompson, Brandon Ratcliff, Carlie Westerman and Brad William Henke