Hooray For Metaphors!
Together is kinda silly ... and so much fun.
The best episode of the television show Archer is called “Skytanic.” It revolves around a rigid airship in which Archer and company get up to shenanigans while looking for a potential bomb on board the dirigible’s maiden voyage.
There’s a lot (A LOT) of background, but what you need to know for this here Aerial Shot is that Lana and Cyril are going through romantic troubles while trying to disarm said bomb and then push it off the ship. Here’s how the script reads:
LANA: I cannot do this alone!
CYRIL: You're not alone!
LANA: Baby! You came back to me!
CYRIL: Well, I really— Lana, there's a lot you and I need to talk about.
LANA: And let's do that, right after we shove this huge bomb off the blimp.
CYRIL: Okay, but then we seriously need to—
LANA: Cyril!
CYRIL: Sorry. Here we go.
CYRIL: Lana, we're not gonna make it!
LANA: Yes, we are, Cyril! We are gonna make it!
CYRIL: Oh, my god! Lana, we made it!
To which Archer so deftly adds in:
A bad TV show wouldn’t comment on this purposefully on-the-nose writing, but Archer knows that this scene so perfectly parallels Lana and Cyril’s relationship status and comments on it in the moment.
Because my brain is a ridiculous place, I hear Archer yell, “Hooray for metaphors!” all the time, especially when watching movies. Which (finally) brings us to Together.
A new horror movie from first-time director Michael Shanks starring real-life married couple Dave Franco and Alison Brie, Together isn’t reinventing the wheel. It centers on a couple who have recently moved out of the city and are struggling to connect, and it is so clearly about codependency, the give and take of relationships and what it means to share your life with someone else.
It’s “Hooray for Metaphors!” The (Horror) Movie, and I had a great time watching it.
Bolstered by two phenomenal leading performances, some directorial flourishes and a yearning to get a bit gross, Together makes up for its pretty simple plot by having so much fun in its squeamishness. Franco and Brie are game for Shanks’ insane ideas, and the 102 minutes fly by … even if you may have to cover your eyes or slide down in your seat.
The general plot of an unhappy couple starting to merge together through … nefarious circumstances isn’t reinventing the wheel (or the genre), but Shanks and crew seem to know this and decide to just go for broke, even if the general premise is pretty one-note. Also, it’s willing to get gross. Which is a big thumbs up from me.
Like last year’s Oscar-winning The Substance, Together feels like an ode to David Cronenberg, John Carpenter and David Lynch from a director so obviously inspired by their grotesque creations. I’ll always take a “let’s try it out” horror movie over basically any other genre.
I don’t think it’ll be in my top 10 or anything by the end of the year, but Together is a hell of a good time, featuring two all-out performances that forced me to shield my eyes once or twice. What else could one want on a Tuesday night?
🚨Aerial Shot Movie Club Update🚨
The plan is for a new Movie Club podcast to drop next week. And that movie is … drumroll please.
GREMLINS, directed by Joe Dante. Picked out by my birthday twin and tennis enthusiast, Jake Richards. You can watch it (or re-watch it or buy the Blu-ray) if you want to before our pod next week. Or not. It’s not my life.
I had never seen the 1984 Christmas comedy-horror before, and boy, did I not know what I was in for. For some reason, I always assumed it was Furby mixed with E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. I guess it technically is, and yet I never would’ve guessed how much death, destruction and kitchen-based carnage there was.
I’d say more, but I’ll save the rest for the podcast.
As always, you can subscribe at your favorite podcast provider. Just look up Aerial Shot, and your go-to search engine will do the rest.
Okay, that’s all I’ve got today. Bye.