TOGETHER. Alison Brie and Dave Franco as Lovebirds [REVIEW]

Although Michael Shanks’s feature debut Together doesn’t lack jump scares and stomach-churning physical transformations, probably the greatest discomfort is caused by an unassuming farewell party scene that Millie and Tim, who are moving to the countryside, throw for their friends. There is no need for a couples therapist to see that things are not going well between the two, and their friends are happy to explain to the protagonists where the problems come from — Tim is a detached-from-reality, overgrown kid, helplessly clinging to his partner, while Millie is a rigid person who doesn’t allow her boyfriend to develop his musical career.

The move to the idyllic countryside, where the girl is to take a teaching position, will of course force the protagonists to confront these problems. It will not be an easy confrontation, as the film’s prologue already announces — reminiscent of John Carpenter’s The Thing and the memorable scene with the gruesome transformation of a dog. Michael Shanks presents here a simple but effective metaphor of relationship codependency and gladly uses proven genre building blocks. Although the area Tim and Millie arrive in seems idyllic, the director fortunately does not try to deceive us — from the beginning, it is known that the surrounding forests hide more than one dark secret.

During an unassuming trip, Tim inadvertently initiates a process as a result of which the protagonists’ bodies begin to mutate into one connected being — and Shanks begins to have fun staging increasingly elaborate grotesqueries. The director clearly takes a lot of pleasure in shocking the viewer (judging by the audience’s reactions at my screening, the goal was achieved), skillfully manages the tension within individual scenes and balances between fear and black humor. The film gains momentum every time Shanks presents another bloody attraction in front of the camera. The creator shows particular ingenuity in the finale, where comparisons of the film to The Stuff appearing here and there gain meaning. Unfortunately, the human element fares somewhat worse in Together. The problem does not stem from how the Millie and Tim relationship thread was written.

The characters’ points of view are clearly laid out, and both Dave Franco and Alison Brie are more than convincing in their roles — this benefits from the decision to cast a real (successful) married couple in the main roles. The acting duo somehow makes both the chemistry still smoldering between the characters and their growing mutual dislike credible. The problem, however, is that the two conventions of the film, horror and drama, work well separately but do not combine particularly smoothly into a whole. Yes, the idea of the protagonists’ bodies merging against their will is a good metaphor for Millie and Tim’s relationship situation.

Aside from that, however, the successive elaborate bodily transformations do not so much advance the story about the relationship’s breakdown as rather duplicate information about the characters that the viewer has already learned earlier. Shanks’s debut is therefore basically two films for the price of one — not entirely satisfying as a whole, but providing enough fun. In his short films, the director has already shown that he can combine original story concepts (I especially recommend Rebooted, a story about a stop-motion skeleton pushed out of the film industry by CGI) and sensitivity to characters with inventive staging.

Despite its flaws, Together is a good prognosis for the creator’s future — both an honest analysis of a disintegrating relationship and a wild symphony of cracking bones, torn skin, and several bottles of fake blood. Written by Jędrzej Paczkowski