Everything, everywhere and at once: review in the true multiverse of madness

taxes and dragon

Evelyn Wang gets off to a rocky start to the day at the family laundromat. Her husband Waymond is considering a divorce, her daughter resents him for not accepting his girlfriend, and her father is visiting the United States, carrying in his luggage all the guilt he can throw at his émigré son’s face.

However, all of this is ultimately just a small thing in the face of the tax adjustment that awaits heroin. What Evelyn does not yet know is that her arrival in the cold and impersonal offices of the tax inspectors will turn into the scene of a breach in the Multiverse. Yes, this same Multiverse that is used by pop culture to justify almost everything and anything, overwhelming metaphysical impulses of rick and morty to the endless “reboot” possibilities of the Marvel script.

Can you hear me, yeah?

Necessarily, everything everywhere at once it might seem telephonic, even opportunistic, in its way of combining a Sundance-flavored American-leaning drama and narrative force with fashion. The surprise card from the film across the Atlantic, which enjoyed word of mouth too rare to be underlined, leaves one wondering. are we facing a true contemporary phenomenon that comes out of the nails (more enjoyable at a time when theaters are struggling to recover from Covid) or a simple stroke of marketing genius?

Fortunately, the feature film by Daniel Scheinert and Daniel Kwan (nicknamed the Daniels) quickly tipped the scales in favor of the first option. Despite the overwhelming number of rules and concepts that allow Evelyn to connect with versions of herself in alternate dimensions, the directing duo (already fronting swiss army man) strives to maintain efficiency in the deployment of its narrative, never to lose the viewer to avalanches of destitute techno-nonsense.

Fortunately, moreover, since otherwise, everything everywhere at once does not give gifts A thousand ideas happen every minute, from a montage discovery to an absurd replica through a delirious gag, all within images that do not stop changing format. It would be criminal to say too much about the ins and outs of the whole thing, let’s just say that kung fu rubs shoulders with, among other things, existential sci-fi movie and…sausage-fingered humans. The result could be exhausting. On the contrary, it couldn’t be more exciting.

“I don’t have friends. I have family” – Dominic Toretto

Multivitamin

On the big screen we appreciate a lot Doctor strange in the multiverse of madness, but we must admit that Sam Raimi’s film disappoints when it tries to get to the heart of its concept. Apart from a single sequence that tries out fun ideas, we otherwise have only a clean future where you have to go through a red light (madness!).

Faced with such lukewarmness, the Daniels’ feature film can only cause syncope in comparison. In the continuity of a single and unique movement, the filmmakers encapsulate entire worlds, passing from one universe to another through interplay and transitions that reveal the generosity of the project.

fingers in worship

Whether you’re having fun parodying animation classics or presenting the funniest martial arts scenes in recent American cinema, everything everywhere at once takes the form ofa cultural pop potpourri always deferential and respectful of its models. The shock is reminiscent of the one caused by the inventiveness of the Wachowskis during the first Matrix, and this is probably not a coincidence. While the most unlikely actions help to connect with the other universes, Evelyn discovers that her original world is nothing more than a normative hyperreality, especially when she tries to escape from offices as relaxing as the ones where Mr. Anderson worked.

However, the feature film can also be compared to a more recent work, namely Three thousand years waiting for you by George Miller. In both cases, the bulimic appetite for fictitious universes that collide, paradoxically, refers to a model of the seventh art, since a return to its fundamental principles. The important thing is the connection between two images to create movement, and two planes to give meaning to that movement, in the midst of the global nonsense of life.

the world is stone

These foundations turn out to be essential for the general architecture of a film that ultimately leaves nothing to chance. Either everything everywhere at once could enjoy his crazy nature (and this is the case in very rare moments), never forget that it serves a strong emotional heart, which constantly redistributes the cards. In the great existential void of the Multiverse, the Daniels always cling to their characters, even the most tertiary ones, to make their desires, their sorrows, their disappointments exist.

Each shot on a universe leads to its reverse shot, to the exploration of a blind spot that transforms each recurring gag into an overwhelming catharsis. Even when it comes to evocatively using a trophy as a butt plug, the film treats its absurdities with a healthy first grade. The humanity it captures only becomes more dazzling in its universality, in turn evoking family resentment, depression, the unspoken, and the need to express a love too often left unsaid.

Ke Huy Quan, absolutely brilliant in all registers

In the mood for love (and Kung Fu)

From there, it’s hard not to be swept away by the meta-dimension of the film, which offers its magnificent actors the role of a lifetime, as revenge against an industry that has denigrated them. While Ke Huy Quan (Waymond) has always been shortened to Half-Moonindiana jones 2more charismatic than ever as a tender husband or a brooding gentleman straight out of a Wong Kar-Wai movie.

But of course, everything everywhere at once it is before everything a declaration of love to michelle yeoh, thanks to a camera that never fails to sublimate the finesse of his game and his martial skills, which remain as impressive as ever. the actress of Tiger and dragon it suddenly becomes more than that, embodying through the Daniels’ delirium a metonym for Hong Kong cinema of yesteryear.

Mount Saint Michelle

Here again we think of the first adventures of Neo, but with a more bittersweet aspect, which evokes the swan song of a certain idea of ​​cinema. If Evelyn goes back to the source of who she is, she generally goes back to the feature film setting. She seeks to close the circle around her referents, so much so that she uses the figure of the circle as a recurring motif, from the washing machine drum to a certain donut.

everything everywhere at once it’s even more impressive and enjoyable, as he always manages to land on his feet, like a miraculous cat (or Schrödinger’s) that would have been thrown from the top of a skyscraper. His hyperactive energy isn’t just an artifice. This is perhaps the best way to place the feature film in a hitherto indomitable modernity, where images link and respond to each other like so many swipes on the timeline of a social network. If the Multiverse is already starting to tire, it is possible that the Daniels have signed one of the definitive works on the subject.