‘Whiskey for the pain…’
Long term relationships are tricky beasts. It’s easy for one party to feel trapped or neglected or stuck-in-a-rut, and these dynamics shift and change over the course of time. There is a general consensus that a kind of love imbalance is a bad thing for a relationship. If one person loves the other way more than they are loved back, this can lead to real problems. Together explores these issues through the prism of folk and body horror in a way that is affecting, often gross and surprisingly funny…
Aspiring musician Tim (Dave Franco) and his teacher partner Millie (Alison Brie) move from an unnamed city to the countryside. Tim feels stymied by this move and longs to pursue his dreams in a place that is a bit more happening. Meanwhile, Millie feels that Tim has become emotionally distant since the death of his parents, and wishes that he would be a bit more present. When the two tumble into a mysterious underground cave whilst out hiking, strange events begin to occur, culminating in some seriously nasty shit.
First-time writer-director Michael Shanks has crated a devilish and entertaining horror/thriller that borrows from David Cronenberg, Brian Yuzna’s Society and Shanks’ own experiences of co-dependency. The result is a film that perhaps doesn’t have much rewatch value, but one that is still hugely entertaining. Aided by a fearless pair of performances from Franco and Brie (it helps, of course, that the two are married in real life), Together was acquired by Neon after a bidding war and it joins the upper echelons of horror films released in 2025 (along with Bring Her Back, Weapons and Sinners – 28 Years Later is on a different level entirely). This is a film that is unafraid to be confrontational, in both its themes and its aesthetic, and while I’m still not sure if the ending fully works, it’s definitely memorable.
Together acts as a jumping off point for yet another talented horror auteur off the production line. We truly are living in a golden age for horror cinema.
