There are a few kinds of horror films, but of the two main camps, there are those that work hard to hide what is at play because their horror/fear/scares live in the reveals, and then there are the ones that let you know the score and the horror is in the unfolding. Together, from writer/director Michael Shanks, falls into the latter category, you know exactly what will be at stake for the protagonists as soon as the chilling opening sets the stage after a search for missing hikers ends with a pair of dogs showing weird obsession with each other only for their owner to discover the terrifying sight of their merged bodies.
So we know what the horror is that Tim (played by Dave Franco) and Millie (played by Alison Brie) face when we meet them at their going-away party. Millie’s friend Cath (played by Mia Morrissey) comments on their codependency despite a lack of intimacy since Tim faced a trauma (we’ll discover this has to do with his dead father and sick mother). On top of everything, Millie doubles down and proposes to him in front of all their friends – he eventually accepts, but not before embarrassing her, thus pushing away her desire to get closer. This push and pull dynamic of wanting to get closer and struggling with it is great when you add in knowing there will be a greater force literally forcing them together. It sets the stage for a genre of film I didn’t even know I could want. Body horror comedy.
I have watched a lot of body horror, having grown up with David Cronenberg, and while his films can be funny and even satirical, there isn’t much humor to be found in the body, even in the naked fighting scene from Eastern Promises. Naked fighting might be funny for most filmmakers, but here, it’s just violent. Shanks and real-life couple Franco and Brie add comedy to the core of body horror with something we’ve seen countless times on screen before. A kiss. But it’s the way Shanks and his cinematographer Germain McMicking film the kiss, and how Brie and Franco perform it— the tight shot as if the camera is trying to merge with the actors while the actors themselves try to merge. This, more than the body flipping, painfully ripping apart, and even home surgery with power tools, raises the bar for the body horror comedy.
I mentioned earlier that Tim had a traumatic experience, which is established at the beginning of the film. When they first move into the house, Tim smells something that Millie cannot and discovers a nest of rats tied (merging?) together above a light fixture. He removes them but is deeply shaken by the experience. Later, when he and Millie get trapped, he explains how he knew to look for the rats and how it connects to his childhood — how his father would come into his room smelling something he couldn’t detect and eventually found a dead rat in that spot. Tim didn’t notice the smell himself because, although he was cooking the rat, he had become used to it. The story doesn’t end there; he also explains how it relates to finding his dead dad (I won’t spoil it), and this story becomes a key part of the film, especially when Millie uses it as a callback during a fight.
There is a use of a Spice Girls song that will give it new meaning.
Together got lots of love at Sundance when it premiered in January, leading to one of the rare bidding wars these days before landing at Neon. It’s currently in theatres.
