All of Us Strangers (2023) Directed by Andrew Haigh 5B
Adam (Andrew Scott) begins a relationship with Harry (Paul Mescal), seemingly the only other tenant in their London high-rise apartment building. Andrew has also taken to visiting his parents in the suburbs, an occurrence that seems to make both his parents (Jamie Bell and Clare Foy) and him happy. Only trouble is his parents have been dead for twelve years. What follows is a very atmospheric examination of loss, isolation and loneliness, one made even more effective by the ensemble acting which is excellent. In a darkly dreamy way, we watch Adam and Harry's relationship grow physically and emotionally deeper while at the same time we get more dribs and drabs of information about the mysterious parents. All this is mostly very sensitively done, and I found myself getting caught up in Adam's life. But then I thought "what is actually going on here?" and that broke the spell. Even if taken as just a metaphor for existence, the plot is grounded upon no reality that I can conceive of or even identify, and no rationale is ever provided to fill in the blanks. This is poor script construction masquerading as misty ambiguity. As well, it does not help that the longer All of Us Strangers continues, the more heart-tugging it gets.
As the screenwriter struggles to say bigger and bigger things, the movie crumbles under the weight of its arbitrary metaphysical assumptions--ultimately there is nothing to ground this story in fantasy or reality. It's just some guy riffing on ideas about loss and death, sometimes effectively, but increasingly not. Ultimately, to borrow Gertrude Stein's description of Oakland, California, "there is no there there." A big reveal near the end, one that seems crass and heavy-handed, only adds to the movie's growing woes, and the sense of whatever sure-handedness the film once possessed has long departed the premisise by this point. There is much I enjoyed about All of Us Strangers. But in the end the movie is little more than high-end schlock.
Adam (Andrew Scott) begins a relationship with Harry (Paul Mescal), seemingly the only other tenant in their London high-rise apartment building. Andrew has also taken to visiting his parents in the suburbs, an occurrence that seems to make both his parents (Jamie Bell and Clare Foy) and him happy. Only trouble is his parents have been dead for twelve years. What follows is a very atmospheric examination of loss, isolation and loneliness, one made even more effective by the ensemble acting which is excellent. In a darkly dreamy way, we watch Adam and Harry's relationship grow physically and emotionally deeper while at the same time we get more dribs and drabs of information about the mysterious parents. All this is mostly very sensitively done, and I found myself getting caught up in Adam's life. But then I thought "what is actually going on here?" and that broke the spell. Even if taken as just a metaphor for existence, the plot is grounded upon no reality that I can conceive of or even identify, and no rationale is ever provided to fill in the blanks. This is poor script construction masquerading as misty ambiguity. As well, it does not help that the longer All of Us Strangers continues, the more heart-tugging it gets.
As the screenwriter struggles to say bigger and bigger things, the movie crumbles under the weight of its arbitrary metaphysical assumptions--ultimately there is nothing to ground this story in fantasy or reality. It's just some guy riffing on ideas about loss and death, sometimes effectively, but increasingly not. Ultimately, to borrow Gertrude Stein's description of Oakland, California, "there is no there there." A big reveal near the end, one that seems crass and heavy-handed, only adds to the movie's growing woes, and the sense of whatever sure-handedness the film once possessed has long departed the premisise by this point. There is much I enjoyed about All of Us Strangers. But in the end the movie is little more than high-end schlock.
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