Thoughts on Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022)

April 26, 2022

I'm not a movie reviewer so I'm mostly just gonna be rambling about what I thought about the film. It's my capsule I can do what I want, I'm trying to stop making every post be professional quality when I just feel like casually writing.

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So I just saw Everything Everywhere All at Once today, and I really enjoyed it. I meant to see it a few weeks ago when it got a wide release but never got around to seeing it until today—and tomorrow's its last day in theaters AFAIK?

I really enjoyed it, I'd give it a 9/10—which is only because it's not quite up there with masterpieces like Synecdoche, New York, but it was still really great.

It was incredibly fast-paced and insane in parts but it kept the descent into madness slow enough that you never felt confused about what was actually happening (barring a few places where that was clearly intended). It managed to actually dive into heavier, deeper themes while juxtaposing that with dadaist comedy which is pretty interesting combo that actually works surprisingly well.

You know what it reminded me of? It felt a lot like Big Trouble in Little China. Not necessarily the themes or plots or characters of the films, but they have a really similar feel: obviously the Asian-American cast and style; they're both extremely fast paced in terms of just… always feeling like things are moving; there's really nice fight scenes that're definitely homaging '80s and '90s martial arts films (the Alamo was actually playing clips from Michelle Yeoh's older films alongside an interview with her before the feature film started); there's a hidden just under your noses aspect to it; and there's a fair share of camp and just nonsensical insanity in both—that they still somehow manage to contextualize into the film where you can understand what's going on.

** SPOILERS BEYOND THIS POINT!
** SPOILERS BEYOND THIS POINT!
** SPOILERS BEYOND THIS POINT!

(Just go see the film, come on man!)

I found it very interesting how drastically the plot changed around halfway through the film. At first it felt like the standard '80s action formula of a struggling everyman that turns out to be the chosen one who bands together with a rag-tag underground group who give exposition and they must fight the irrational evil force that's creating/stealing a MacGuffin that can destroy the city/world/galaxy/universe/multiverse (bonus points for the evil force being related to the chosen one, Star Wars style). A complete homage to '80s & '90s action films, but it felt a very trite and while the presentation kept me captivated I wasn't hopeful plot-wise.

However all of a sudden, the plot completely shifts: the evil force actually doesn't care about destroying anything—although they don't care when they do destroy something, true nihilsts; the underground group turn out to be ignorant sidenotes that have no bearing on anything actually meaningful; and the chosen one was just a rando that happen to learn enough by this point to become the chosen one. Definitely a welcome surprise and a wonderful break from standard movie plot formats.

The everything donut was a great pun and visual metaphor, a way of saying right off the bat to not take the film ** that seriously—in case you somehow hadn't realized that yet :P.