Me and You and Everyone We Know
Some films (and books, for that matter) are not especially promising in the first few minutes, and you have to be patient and give them a chance to draw you in. When we watched “Me and You and Everyone We Know” (“MAYAEWK” to save my typing fingers a bit) at the weekend, Mr. Bsag asked after ten minutes “Remind me why we decided to rent this again?”. However MAYAEWK is well worth a little patience.
The plot has a number of strands, following a group of inter-related characters. Christine (played by director Miranda July) is a video performance artist, giving a voice and narrative to people’s family snapshots, and trying to get her work exhibited by a local gallery. Her work reminded me of Laurie Anderson’s slightly, and there were other touches in the dialogue here and there that made me think of Anderson. I wonder if July is a fan? In her day job Christine runs a taxi service for elderly people, ferrying Michael to meet his new love, Ellen, who is very ill in a care home.
Christine meets and falls in love with shoe salesman Richard—-recently separated from his wife Pam, and trying to keep things together for his two sons, Peter and Robby—-when she takes Michael shopping. There are also two (underage) teenaged girls who flirt dangerously with Richard’s work colleague and friend, Andrew, and little Sylvie—-a serious young girl with a fetish for kitchenware to fill her trousseau.
