MOVIE REVIEW: The Only Thing That Matters is "Everything Everywhere All At Once"

April 7, 2022 Todd Pengelly

12/12 ForReel Score | 5/5 Stars

There may be a universe where Everything Everywhere All At Once isn’t a smash hit. There may be a universe where the kaleidoscopic, multiversal scope of the film is too burdensome, too wrought, too overwhelming to be enjoyable. There may be a universe where the psychedelic vision of filmmakers Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, known collectively as Daniels, is too trippy for their own good.

We do not live in that universe. In our universe, Everything Everywhere All At Once isn’t just an enjoyable hit - it’s a generational landmark.

The sophomore film from Daniels, the duo who first got recognition for 2016’s Swiss Army Man, is part martial arts flick, part dramedy, part fever dream, part Internet-era philosophy discourse. The film follows Evelyn Wang (Michelle Yeoh), a Chinese immigrant struggling to balance a failing marriage, a failing laundromat business, and a failing bond with her adult daughter. Her life appears to be coming apart at the seams. Evelyn’s business is being audited, her family is exhausted by her, and she’s recently taken to caring for her father. Just when it seems like there’s no hope for her future, Evelyn is pulled into a janitor’s closet and told that it is up to her to save not only her own future, but that of every other world in an infinite multiverse.

What follows is, without doubt or exaggeration, one of cinema’s greatest studies of parenting, philosophy, and fanny-pack fighting. Michelle Yeoh, joined by Stephanie Hsu, James Hong, and Jamie Lee Curtis, as well as a triumphant return to the silver screen for Ke Huy Quan, turn in stellar performance after stellar performance - each as multifaceted as their multiversal characters. Everything Everywhere All At Once, on a technical level as well, is a master class in editing, costuming, and cinematography. There is nothing the film’s crew can’t do. The film effortlessly channels the styles of its predecessors, from the Wachowski sisters to Wong Kar-Wai, without losing a drop of its own unique creativity. On every level, Everything Everywhere All At Once shines.

While that excellence certainly contributes to the film’s success, it isn’t what makes Everything Everywhere All At Once so special. This is a film that will be remembered, cherished, honored even, because of what it makes you feel. On its face, it is only a film about infinite universes, mother-daughter struggles, and sci-fi-infused martial arts. But below the surface is a movie about the constant struggle between nihilism and optimism. That’s a struggle that increasingly permeates our everyday lives.

Neither Evelyn, nor I, are alone in feeling like we’re failures. We aren’t alone in feeling like everything we do every single day will amount to nothing. We aren’t alone in our feeling that this singular moment in time, right now - a blip in the timeline of history, a speck in just one neverending universe in an infinite multitude of them - is worthless. All the stress, all the strife, all the struggles…they don’t matter. But we’re consumed by them, nonetheless. All of us. Everyday. Everywhere.

But why? That’s the question at the heart of Daniels’ Everything Everywhere All At Once. If our lives are tiny, foolishly worthless drops in a pond too big to imagine, why be consumed by the bad? Why not embrace the good? In embracing nihilism, so too does Everything Everywhere All At Once embrace the absurdity of life, the idealism, the kindness. Whether you’re a pinata swinging in the wind, an IRS agent with hotdog fingers, or an aging immigrant with a failing laundromat - nothing matters. So, enjoy it. Hold your loved ones. Do the things you want. Break the rules. It doesn’t matter.

That’s where Everything Everywhere All At Once leaves its mark. Yes, its construction is excellent. The performances and direction are career-defining. But its impact emotionally and spiritually is where it hits the hardest. For two hours and nineteen minutes, Daniels created a space where something matters. And in a universe where everything is worthless, it’s miraculous to find anything this worthwhile.