Those folks being who they are, their Valentines were modest comedy-dramas, which gave them the opportunity to shamble, emote, and sparkle. Michelle Yeoh being who she<\/em> is means her Valentine is a hyperactive mixture of martial arts, broad comedy, and sci-fi world-building. It\u2019s called Everything Everywhere All At Once, <\/em>it\u2019s directed by Daniels (Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert) of Swiss Army Man<\/em> fame, and if it\u2019s a bit too <\/em>hyperactive, well, that\u2019s probably forgivable, considering what it\u2019s setting out to do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It begins as a familial comedy, albeit an uncommonly tense one. Evelyn Wang (Yeoh) is a laundromat owner who is stretched to the breaking point \u2013 her judgmental father (James Hong) is visiting for his birthday, her daughter Joy (Stephanie Hsu) is all but estranged, her husband Waymond (Ke Huy Quan) is about to divorce her, and an irritating IRS agent (Jamie Lee Curtis) is auditing the laundromat Evelyn and Waymond co-own. You could politely call her a flawed heroine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But suddenly, unexpectedly, everything changes. During a visit to the IRS office (inconveniently enough), Waymond\u2019s body is suddenly taken over by another version of himself \u2013 a Waymond Alpha, who explains that all of the choices and life-paths Evelyn should have taken and didn\u2019t have created, around her, a multiverse of parallel realities. \u201cEvery rejection, every disappointment, led you here, to this woman,\u201d he says \u2013 a good line \u2013 as he lays out the rules and jargon of \u201cverse-jumping\u201d and all of the alternate iterations of herself she can tap into. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t make any sense!\u201d she protests. \u201cExactly!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n So what we have here is a Matrix<\/em>-style search for The One, though Evelyn is a reluctant world-saver, to put it mildly. When (under considerable duress) she makes these leaps, and takes on these combinations, the screen splits jaggedly, like a shattered mirror. He see her other selves in quick-cut montages: an opera singer, a chef, a house keeper at an S&M club, and best of all, a version where she is basically Michelle Yeoh, a kung-fu master movie star, cleverly deploying her own iconography (and, in what must\u2019ve helped the budget, her own red carpet footage). Her work here has a fierce physicality, which is expected, but what\u2019s striking is how the Daniels patiently deploy the tools she\u2019s acquired over a career \u2013 how much she can convey with a look, a glance, a stare.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cEverything Everywhere All At Once\u201d is, unsurprisingly, visually striking. The Daniels\u2019 music video background is present in their gonzo compositions and hyper-saturated look, and there\u2019s a welcome sense of weirdness and joy in their surprise juxtapositions, especially further on (because the deeper they get, the more versions of her they\u2019re juggling). And though it\u2019s Yeoh\u2019s show, they give her supporting cast plenty of opportunities to step up; Hong get laughs just by being old and mad, Hsu handles the later, more poignant sections with aplomb, and Curtis is clearly having a blast. But the real find \u2013 if that word is even appropriate \u2013 is Quan, so delightful as a child actor in \u201cThe Goonies\u201d and \u201cIndiana Jones and the Temple of Doom,\u201d returning to the screen after a long absence. His big fight scene, using only his hands and an artfully deployed fanny pack, is one of the film\u2019s high points.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But the filmmakers are occasionally too pleased by their own cleverness, and some of the jokes are awfully infantile (even by the standards of the guys who made the \u201cfarting corpse movie\u201d). It\u2019s inventive, but bombastically so, which becomes clear during a sequence with two rocks \u2013 I\u2019ll say no more \u2013 which is funny and poignant but also refreshing, because the movie slows down for a damn minute. A film\u2019s pace and tempo aren\u2019t just about its speed; it\u2019s also a question of variety, and the non-stop go-go-go nature \u201cEverything Everywhere All At Once\u201d is initially exciting but eventually exhausting. Its fast and furious, anything-goes wildness is initially its strength, and eventually its flaw. “Everything Everywhere All at Once” is in theaters Friday.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/evrerything2-1024x682.jpg\")
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