:
Anna Friel,
Michelle Williams,
Kyle MacLachlan,
more...
:
Sandra Goldbacher
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: 
: Columbia TriStar
: Drama, Foreign, Costume Drama/Period Piece, British Drama, Coming of Age , UK
: 101 min.
: English
: English
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This title is currently out of print.
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The joys and horrors of female friendship are explored in writer/director Sandra Goldbacher's Me Without You. Bold, brash, and fashionable Marina (played by Anna Popplewell as a child, and Anna Friel as a teen and adult) comes from a broken home. Her mother, Linda (Trudie Styler, who executive produced Guy Ritchie's first two films, and is also Sting's wife) is a hip young divorcée who apologizes every time she yells at her children. Holly (Ella Jones as a child, Michelle Williams of Dawson's Creek and Dick as a teen and adult) is a timid bookworm, mildly ashamed of her Jewishness, and easily goaded into more outrageous behavior by Marina. Holly's mother (Deborah Findlay) tells her early on not to expect too much from men. She helps lower her daughter's expectations by telling her, "Some people are pretty people, and some are clever people, which is more important than looks." As girls in the early '70s, Marina and Holly form a pact to become "Harina," inseparable best friends. Next-door neighbors, they are never apart for long. But Holly harbors a secret crush on Marina's older brother, Nat (Oliver Milburn), and when the girls are teens, and Marina finds out about Holly's feelings, she does her best to keep the two apart. In college, when Holly bonds with a lit-crit professor, Daniel (Kyle Maclachlan), over Andrei Tarkovsky and Ingmar Bergman, Holly feels compelled to sabotage their budding relationship, by seducing Daniel first. Eventually, Nat, despite his lingering fondness for Holly, gets seriously involved with a French actress, Isabel (Marianne Denicourt). As the girls get older, their differences become more apparent to Holly, and she begins to question their friendship. The film covers three decades, with songs and costumes appropriate to each era. ~ Josh Ralske, All Movie Guide
GreenCine Staff Pick: Sandra Goldbacher's lovely and underrated Me Without You is one of the few of the spate of recent female bonding pictures to actually get that right (take that, Ya Yas), following as it does two English girls' intense intense friendship (and intense sexual rivalry), on into adulthood over the course of twenty years. As Goldbacher's first feature, the Victorian era piece The Governess, reminded me of a more emotionally complex Jane Austen, Me Without You, even if set in the 20th century, more directly reminds of Austen, in humor, tone and plotting, in which the characters are both appreciably wise and yet self-sabotaging in the way that people are. The male characters are thankfully three-dimensional whereas they could easily have all been conveniently drab louts. Kyle MacLachlan in particular has a great supporting role as the college lecturer both women fall for. But it is Anna Friel and Michelle Williams (American, but with a spot-on accent) who bring the story of this often-toxic friendship fully to life. It may be a "small" film, but Me Without You is large in heart and emotional scope. -- Tamara Lees
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| Better-than-Average Brit Chick Flick
by talltale
September 3, 2004 - 3:57 PM PDT
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4 out of 4 members found this review helpful
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| Sandra Goldbacher's ME WITHOUT YOU is a much-better-than-average "relationship movie" about two teenage best friends and their entangled lives as they grow up and approach middle age. It's full of well-observed details of life, love, companionship and competitiveness--some of this pretty nasty stuff, but all of it real and interesting. Michelle Williams and Anna Friel are both excellent in the lead roles (if you didn't already know Williams from "Dick" or TV's "Dawson's Creek," you might think she was indeed a Brit). The supporting cast, from Alan Corduner (of TOPSY-TURVY) to France's Marianne Denicourt (so good in the recent MONIQUE) are all excellent, as well. The movie captures the culture blips in the 25-year span from 1973 to 2001--via colors, music, hairstyles and more--so it's as enjoyable visually as it is intellectually and emotionally. OK, OK--this IS another chick flick, as I have heard from a few people, as though this were a "dis." I sometimes wonder what it might take to get guys to pay attention to how girls/women think, feel and behave. (They only represent more than half of the world's population, so perhaps they're just not important enough yet.) This worthwhile movie might make an interesting place for some intrepid fellows to begin.... |
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GreenCine Member Rating
(Average 6.73)
41 Votes
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