Together Together (2021)

[Adam Lenhardt]

Title: Together Together (2021)

Genre: Comedy, Drama

Director: Nikole Beckwith

Cast: Ed Helms, Patti Harrison, Rosalind Chao, Anna Konkle, Evan Jonigkeit, Tig Notaro, Nora Dunn, Fred Melamed, Sufe Bradshaw, May Calamawy, Ellen Dubin, Tucker Smallwood, Timm Sharp, Jo Firestone, Travis Coles, Johnathan Fernandez, Julio Torres, Bianca Lopez, Terri Hoyos, Greta Titelman, Ithamar Enriquez, Caitlin Kimball, Casey Feigh, Jennifer Churchich, Gail Rastorfer, David Chattam, Ayla Rose Barreau, Lucy Kaminsky, Krystle Comer, Vivian Gil, Heidi Mendez, Gregory Garcia

Release: 2021-04-23

Runtime: 90

Plot: When young loner Anna is hired as the surrogate for Matt, a single man in his 40s, the two strangers come to realize this unexpected relationship will quickly challenge their perceptions of connection, boundaries and the particulars of love.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

I'm a sucker for movies about unconventional families, so I really tried (but failed) to see this when it was playing at the local arthouse theater. It was a nice surprise to see it available free to stream on Hulu.

Former "Office" star Ed Helms plays Matt, an awkward and frequently pedantic fortysomething app developer. After an eight-year relationship ends and his app Loner -- a dating app with no actual dating -- hits it big, he decides to plow ahead with fatherhood solo.

Stand-up comedian Patti Harrison plays Anna, the understated but slightly misanthropic twentysomething barista who signs on as Matt's surrogate. After a falling out with her family following a teen pregnancy in high school, she moved to a city she didn't know with a guy who didn't stick around. She sees the money from being a surrogate as a means to get her life back on track.

The situation is inherently incommodious, but even so the dynamic between them gets off to a rocky start. Matt is intrusive and at times overbearing; he has a very specific vision for how this pregnancy is going to go, and his efforts to facilitate that are not always desired or appreciated by Anna.

But Matt and Anna, both isolated and lonely people when the story begins, gradually develop a deep platonic friendship. They enjoy each other's company, and together they feel less alone. That creates its own problems: Matt desperately wants to be a dad, but Anna doesn't have any interest in being a mother.

Both of the leads are well cast. Matt would have been an easy character to get wrong; both the script and direction from Nikole Beckwith and Helms's performance are careful to make sure that Matt's overbearing qualities don't become controlling. There is a gentle steadiness to Matt that made me believe that Anna would grow to trust him. And while Matt is very forward with his opinions, when Anna pushes back he respects her point of view and accommodates it.

There have been many cisgender actors over the years that have played transgender characters. Patti Harrison, as Anna, is one of the first transgender actresses I've encountered playing a cisgender character. Harrison "passes" as female, so it's not something that would even be on the audience's radar if they didn't know going into the film. And it doesn't feel like stunt casting, because Harrison is absolutely the right person to play Anna. The challenge playing Anna is that she has to be guarded but warm, feminine but not maternal. Just like Matt, the character is a bit of a tightrope. And Harrison is zeroed in on Anna's experience every moment she's on screen.

My one criticism with the film is structural; it's built around the three trimesters of the pregnancy, but that means we don't get to witness the aftermath. By the time Anna goes into labor, the movie has raised some big questions about the consequences of their messy situation. But by ending immediately after labor, it doesn't actually answer any of them.

 

[Colin Jacobson]

Anyone else think it was a bad idea to release "Together" a few months after "Together Together"?

They were distributed by the same company - didn't anyone think maybe one of the movies should have a different title?

Did people think "Together" was a prequel to "Together Together"?