★★★ Me and You and Everyone We Know

[Gino: 4.5, TwoShoes: 4.5, Twinkletoes: 1.0, Tiny: 1.5]

Gino says: "Now, my 4.5 stars might be a little inflated by the following:

1. The first-time director/writer/actress was at our screening, and she was nice.
   
2. We were on a babysitter-parents-out-alone-high.
   
3. It was a lovely day in Olde City Phildelphia.
   
4. I have started to notice that I never give more than a 4.0 anymore, and I should really start sometime.
   

(Let me say a little side note that there is some kinda-disturbing stuff involving the juxtoposition of children and sex in this film.) It was shot on video, but you don't even notice that after the first 5 seconds. It had the quality to it that made it unrealistic and yet realistic at the same time. What would be normally annoying like 'people don't have conversations like that in real life!' kinda thing was somehow not annoying to me in this one. All that said, I thought the film was truly poetic at times, very funny at times, and appropriately sad in between. Really a beautiful film. Please go see it if it gets a wide release this summer."

Twinkletoes says: "From my score I guess one can tell I was very disappointed with this thing. Especially after hearing it got the prestigous Gino Film of The Year Award. I'm not quite sure what the intention of this movie was. My guess was I was supposed to connect with these characters in some way. It seemed like all of the characters were written to be "everyman" types, your normal everyday people that you don't generally see in movies. But while I certainly didn't feel any particular malice towards any of these charcters, I also didn't like or empathize with any of them either. They all just left me cold. They ran the gamut from mildly unlikable to mildly pity worthy and all of them were incredibly annoying. Who acts like this? Who talks like this? Seriously now, if someone started walking next to you and talking about how this walk was some sort of metaphor for your relationship with her what would you do? Is that how people would react to seeing a goldfish on top of a car? It all seemed too staged, too cute and to foreign from anything or anyone I know to gain my sympathies.

Now if the film wasn't supposed to connect with me and I was supposed to be revulsed, well it didn't do that either. It felt like the film at times wanted to push itself into a Todd Solondz type of uncomfortable horror but was unwilling to not try to be cute. In the end I felt like it was a pretentious and boring piece of crap. I really hated this thing. Maybe I just didn't get it as it seems many like this film a lot. I'm really curious to hear what Tiny would think of this film."

Gino says: "I would feel like Twinkletoes was over-reacting to make sure he brings down the previous 4.5 average. But then reading the post: he really hates it. I too want Tiny to rent it now. I am pretty sure, of course that he'll give it somewhere in-between. In any case, no one should go into it expecting a gripping narrative or realistic characters. Think of it more like a painting or tone poem (which are sometimes pretentious). But the movie was free of cynicism, I think."

Tiny says: "This was awful, but had enough artistic quality, and a few nice scenes, such that I could not give it a 1.0 or less. I was bored at times and generally annoyed at other times. I laughed sometimes, but I'm not sure I was supposed to. I thought the poop thing was stupid, although the payoff scene at the park bench was almost worth it. I should say that I never would have rented it if the two of you hadn't urged me to do so. So on the one hand, it is not surprising that I disliked a movie I never would have rented in the first place. On the other hand, Gino's second post above certainly tried to frame my expectations appropriately, and nonetheless, I was disappointed."