We Go Way Back

In a cinema landscape bloated on cookie cutter movies and TV show adaptations starring Ben Stiller, it sure it nice to find an original voice with something valid and important to say. Lynn Shelton's debut feature sets sail on an intangible journey, a segment of a girl's life doubled back on itself in search of direction and meaning.

There are a lot of smart choices made in this film. With songs by the highly underrated Laura Veirs to the unique and sublime The Decemberists, the soundtrack alone should have a long shelf life. Amber Hubert might be the best find since Chloe Sevigny, and Maggie Brown's understated haunting performance will burn images of her face into your brain for days to come.

Funny, unexpected, poetic moments litter the film with small surprises and grand yet surreal revelations. Cinematography, editing, acting, direction, and music are all way way above par. Films with a seemingly palpable soul are few and far between. This is one of those films.

The story and the characters in this masterpiece create such a unique atmosphere that has rarely been accomplished on film. The whole thing is a mesmerizing journey into one woman's mind, which feels both familiar and wildly original at the same time. But it is not familiar in the sense that we've seen it before in other movies from the past. Instead, it is something many of us have felt in our real lives. It is nostalgia, but not quite. It is a longing for the past, perhaps. Trying to remember something that you'll never remember accurately. It is useless to try to explain it, yet it is accomplished brilliantly in this beautiful, poetic little film.

Quietly devastating yet ultimately uplifting film. It captures the particularly female experience of putting others needs ahead of one's own- and this being the expectation of the people around the main character. We are introduced to character after character happily and quite blindly taking advantage and even glorifying her selflessness. The scene where the director of the play toasts Kate is perfect. The psychological brutality of the movie is hidden by how normalized this all is- how easy it is to just not see.

I like funny films, and they are a rarity these days. So I wasn't looking forward to this film (my girlfriend was, of course), and so was very pleasantly surprised. Much of the theater stuff--earnest actors and director trying to find a way to make Ibsen "relevant"--was just laugh-out-loud funny. The actor playing the director was perfect (I don't think I've seen him, or any of the others, before). Otherwise, it took me a while to find a way in to the film, as the lead actress was a bit catatonic, but as the film got deeper into Kate's feelings of loss and confusion (and the laughs dried up), I was completely swept into it. Again, perhaps because I wasn't expecting it, that feeling of loss and confusion, and how hard it is to find our own way, just swept over me and I started to cry. Yes, I actually "laughed and cried."

I would consider WE GO WAY BACK to be something of a psychological drama, if that is a thing. It's a very interesting story about a young woman acting in a play and the things that she endures during rehearsals. It goes quite a bit deeper. She finds letters from herself that she wrote when she was a young girl. Then something unexpected and surprising happens.

The film feels a bit uneven. It is funny at times and strange at others, but always interesting. It is always fascinates. I am surprised it has such a low star rating on this website. Overall it is worth watching. Recommend.