“If they be two, they are two so / As stiff twin compasses are two: / Thy soul, the fixed foot, makes no show / To move, but doth, if the other do.” — Andrew Marvell
The horror movie Together is many things, but it’s not like the other movies by that title, such as Lukas Moodysson’s evocation of life in a 1970s hippie commune or Chen Kaige’s melodrama about a classical violin prodigy. Rather, it is the best piece of body horror since The Substance, and it would not work nearly as well if its lead actors weren’t married to each other and well-versed in comedy even while they commit fully to the story’s terrifying qualities. It is, whether the filmmaker intended this or not, the greatest argument I’ve ever seen in favor of remaining single for your entire life. And it’s opening today rather than on Friday, making it worth a midweek trip to the multiplex
The movie starts with unsuccessful musician Tim (Dave Franco) moving from the big city to the countryside for his longtime girlfriend Millie (Alison Brie), who has taken a job as a schoolteacher. While they’re exploring the forest around their new house, Tim accidentally falls into a pit. Millie tries to pull him up, but instead he pulls her down, a stark metaphor for things to come. Once they get back to the surface and into their home, they find that their bodies are starting to fuse together. That comes after they have sex, which results in a bloody scene that both men and women will find uniquely painful to witness.
Australian writer-director Michael Shanks (who’s not to be confused with the Canadian actor by the same name) displays great talent in this, his first feature film. In the pit, he plays tricks with the pools of water and the dead leaves blowing around inside to make the aperture seem to possess its own life. His script makes a cheeky reference to Plato’s belief in soulmates split off from ourselves, and it also uses The Spice Girls’ “2 Become 1” in outrageous fashion during the climax. When Tim and Millie are pulled toward each other like magnets, the contortions in Millie’s body will make your back hurt and make you wonder whether Brie is actually twisting herself like that. (She is not.)
Because the horror is neither coming from an external threat nor from their new house, it puts great pressure on the two actors. Actors who are in offscreen relationships don’t always succeed in replicating that chemistry for the cameras, so it’s good that not only do Franco and Brie display their understanding of each other’s rhythms, they also inject a leavening amount of absurdity into the proceedings. As Millie prepares to use a power drill to separate their arms, she stops before the fatal moment to tell him, “By the way, you were right. I should have listened to you.”
I have an issue with the movie’s final shot, which is a joke that doesn’t work and also deflates the metaphor. That takes very little away from Together’s accomplishment of making a one-of-a-kind horror show out of couplehood. Tim tells Millie, “I remember what life was before you. I was miserable, always dreaming of some other life where my bullshit adolescent dreams came true.” You can read that as the ultimate in romanticism, giving up part of oneself for something greater. To me, it sounds awfully codependent, especially in light of his earlier speech about finding his mother sleeping next to his father’s rotting corpse because she couldn’t accept her husband’s death. Either way, where romantic comedies are about the joy of bonding to another person for life, this horror movie addresses the terrors of that experience by making that bond literal.
Together
Starring Dave Franco and Alison Brie. Written and directed by Michael Shanks. Rated R.
