Thursday, April 7, 2022

'Everything Everywhere All At Once' A Review

Everything Everywhere All At Once is a scifi dramedy about Evelyn(Michelle Yeoh) a wife and mother struggling under familial as well as professional pressures as her laundromat is being audited when a strange change comes over her husband Waymond(Ke Huy Quan) who then tells her he is actually a version of her husband from an alternate reality and that all the parallel worlds, including Evelyn's own, are under threat and she is the only one who can save them.

Yeoh puts in an award worthy, all-time career best, performance. She's able to deploy her, considerable, martial talents as well as display a wide range of both comedic and dramatic ability that she has previously, at least in Hollywood, not been given the opportunity to do, and she absolutely soars. It's a complicated, layered, absolutely dynamic portrayal full of laughs and pathos and crisp thrilling action. Utterly stunning. Quan, having mostly retired from on-screen acting, makes a titanic comeback, he is fluid and electric, masterful in his switches between versions of his character and adept at the bizarre and ever shifting tone as well as glorious in the fight sequences. Both Yeoh and Quan are transcendent in their multi-faceted exuberant roles. Stephanie Hsu as Joy, Evelyn and Waymond's daughter, is equally emotional and plays beautifully off Yeoh and Quan and she has equal facility with the changes of character and the roiling mix of genres. The other stand out, admist the truly delicious supporting cast, is Jamie Lee Curtis as the auditor who goes wonderfully big and broad.

Visually the film is kaleidoscopic, with impeccably crisp fight choreography, psychedelic editing, deeply rich production design and costuming, it is so assured and could so easily become messy yet it folds and ties together perfectly. And perhaps there is periodic confusion when the plot twists on itself, then twists again, but in those moments the humor and stunning and effecting emotion carry it through. Further description of the narrative would only serve to ruin its lavish surprises.

A triumph.

Currently in theaters, coming soon to VOD.

Don't Miss It.

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