A different look at modern parenting conveys enough in a fairly brief period to get through its broad and pat strokes to heartwarming, if bittersweet effect.
Together Together comes from writer/director Nikole Beckwith and stars EdHelms (Cedar Rapids, We’re The Millers) and Patti Harrison (a comedian who’s appeared in films like A Simple Favor and recently Raya and the Last Dragon)
This two-hander relates kindred folks at different points in their lives – Harrison’s barista Anna in her mid-20s and Helms’ app developer Matt twenty years her senior looking to be a single dad.
They come together in ways hat might connect to aspects of films like Lost In Translation and Juno as Matt becomes hands-on-in retaining a pregnant Anna to be the surrogate mother. A Pushiness is there when ‘it comes to her intimate like, making sure she has comfortable footwear and drinking the right beverages.
A naïveté when it comes to the emotions from the self-inflicted and estranged enriches an experience that includes a New-Age Lamaze class. Ford what goes on during the trimesters a painful, bittersweet truth simmers beneath the levity.
Beckwith maneuvers a juggling act that may provoke criticism of the set-up, misunderstandings and the method of character development that may feel a little too dry and closed-off. The idea of what the relationship represents and how it could end up is buoyed by an earthly rapport.
Together Together is like a rally that leads to a sudden conclusion not without a lively turn that’s in Helms’ comfort zone. Still, Matt’s avid nature is nicely tempered with a welcome vulnerability. The investment in this less contrived experience blossoms from the vivid with and saturnine edges steered by a trans Harrison with a disarming delicacy.
The welcome, if mostly uninvolved ensembles includes recognizable faces like Rosalind Chao and Nora Dunn as a relatable low0budgeter gestates with soulful empathy.