Love is a Wreath of Flowers That Smell Bad

It's rare that I go to a film that I know little to nothing about, yet that's what happened last night. I watched Me, You, and Everyone We Know. This is an unusual film. The closest films I could compare it to is either American Beauty or Happiness, or possibly even Ghost World. Don't read more if you want to see the film fresh, which is a pretty good way to watch it.

The film is an ensemble piece, dealing with several different stories. John Hawkes plays Richard, a shoe salesman, who's recently separated from his wife. Nowadays, a mixed-race relation goes without much saying, and yet, it's still not terribly common to see in films. She's African American. He's white. The issue of race is not discussed, really, except possibly that the two kids, who look mixed, with hairstyles resembling 70s cuts, seem odd for children.

The older son who's in his teens is quiet and stays on the computers all day to chat. His younger brother, who appears to be 5 or 6, hangs around his brother, appears to be an innocent, filled with peculiar insights.

In fact, everyone is somewhat off-kilter in the whole film. Miranda July plays Christine. She's an artist, who imagines relationships with guys, tries to be good, but seems terribly insecure. To make ends meet, she drives elderly people to their destinations.

The opening sequence of the film is indicative of what the film is like. Christine has picked up her eldely man for a ride to the shoe store. They spy a family that has just bought a goldfish, put in a bag. The father puts the bag on top of the car, and then forgets to bring it in., and begins to drive. Christine and Michael, who appears to be a Latino retiree, are fearful for the fish.

If they tell the man that he has a fish in a bag on top of the car, the man is likely to stop the car, and the fish will fling off and die. If he accelerates, the same might happen. They decide not to tell him. Christine feels sorry for the fish and says that even though she never knew the fish, she loves the fish, and it should know it was loved. Another car then cuts off the man, he decelerates, the fish bag flies in the air, and lands on the car ahead of it.

Realizing the fish is still alive, they decide they can save the fish if they keep the car it's on steady, so they pull ahead of the car with the fish, and it's now sandwiched between the car that had the first, and Christine's car. For a while, you see the three cars in close proximity from overhead, all working together to save the fish. Finally, the middle car rushes out, and the bag with the fish in it is gone.

In this one scene, you have three groups of people. The people who bought the fish, and probably think of it as barely a pet. The people that have the fish, after the bag lands on their car, who have no idea that they have anything to do with anything, and Christine and Michael, who see all, and desperately want the fish to do well. And there's the fish itself, who also has no idea what's going on. It's swimming in a bag.

Mirandy July, director and playing Christine, mines this for both humor, and a kind of insight. She has a quirky view on life.

Christine falls for Richard, who has sold her pink shoes and Michael bright blue Nikes. Richard still has to care for his sons, Robby and Peter. Peter meets two female classmates, Rebecca and Heather, who like to tease him, and older men, including Andrew, a fellow shoe salesman. He talks to Rebecca and Heather, who flirt with him by kissing one another, before he begins to put his fantasies on his window, which no one, save the girls, seem to notice. Sylvie is an 8 year old who is interested in Peter, even though he appears to be 15.

July is interested in sexuality, and has challenging roles for the children. The girls, who pretend to be 18, are trying to seduce an older man, yet want to know who gives the better blow job, and ask Peter to decide. To offset the possible inappropriateness, July amps the weirdness, but in oddly believable ways. The two girls insist on towels, dry and wet, plus candy or a cookie, plus a CD for the right kind of music.

Peter is oddly neat, providing the towels nicely folded, on a tray, and two mints on top, as if he were working for a hotel.

The two girls are doing a blind taste test as it were, and yet, want the experience to be neat and tidy, as a real experiment.

If that's risque, July also has two younger kids, Sylvie and Robby, involved in even more bizarre ongoings. Robby comes up with the bizarrest idea and tells his older brother, Peter, to type this to a possible-woman named "Untitled". He says that he wants to poop in her asshole, and that she poops it back into his, and it goes back and forth, forever. It's an oddly gross and mature fantasy, said by the mouth of a five year old, and July revels in this scene. Peter says "OK, what do you want me to type", and as he begins to repeat what he said, it is oddly hilarious to hear a kid saying this, because it almost sounds like something a kid would say, since kids can be obsessed with poop, and yet, with twisted enough that a kid might not say it.

Robby is an innocent, interpreting sexual advances by Untitled, as a kid would. He likes to play, but not in the same way an adult "plays". He wants to have friends. He likes to be with people. The idea of sex really has not crossed his mind, and yet, here he is talking to someone (is it he or she?) who has no idea that Robby is only 5. This is the first film that deals with chat in somewhat realistic ways, where the two sides have no idea who the other are.

Sylvie, on the other hand, seems much older, and yet, associates herself with a time long since gone. She goes to the store and buys items from department stores that she puts in a "hope chest". This, she claims, is her dowry for the man she will marry, and for the daughter she will raise. She asks the saleswoman whether a Braun hand mixer will go out of style in twenty years. Initially, it's meant to sound that she wants a product that's quality, showing a savvy consumerist flair, odd for a child her age, but then it's revealed that it's for her dowry, and she's planning ahead.

Sylvie seems drawn to the older Peter, and he to her.

And I'm leaving out Richard, who acts mostly with his eyes. He's trying to be a good dad, and yet, in an early scene, he tries to burn his hand, and it looks like some odd scene from a Pink Floyd album. When he explains later on, that he thought he had alcohol which burns without burning, but instead had lighter fluid, it is both quirkily funny, and also explains that while he might be crazy, it's a kind of offbeat crazy. It's a weird justification for his behavior.

He wanders through this film looking slightly lost. Christine wants Richard to date him, but pretty much stalks him. They walk down a street to their cars parked interminably far, as she and he make an analogy of how the street represents their relationship which they haven't had. At least, not yet.

Ultimately, I think July wants to show that relationships occupy a much greater universe than we normally see. Even relationships that would normally be seen as disturbing, might not be nearly as disturbing in reality. For example, she plays up a scene that would normally be a "special episode of Webster" (and sadly, it really was), when she has the person who has sent the instant message talk to the little boy, Robby. Robby has no idea who he'll meet. He seems to just want to meet a playpal. The other also has no idea, and is seeking some sort of lover, more likely her own age, and when that person sees Robby, a weird thought passes, as if the universe had, for a moment, briefly wanted them together.

This is an accomplished film, dealing with many issues, in an odd, yet funny way. Even though it touches on many topics that would otherwise seem highly offensive, July creates a world that resembles our own, but is just off in many different spots, enough for us to accept what happens without being totally grossed out. If anything, she sympathizes with these characters who in their way are seeking happiness, and yet, without the kind of strong sense of animosity that Solondz has.

Oh yes.

Macaroni.