Michelle Yeoh in Everything Everywhere All at Once, in cinemas from today.
Michelle Yeoh in Everything Everywhere All at Once, in cinemas from today.
Iconic Malaysian actor Michelle Yeoh (Crazy Rich Asians, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) is at the centre of this ridiculously entertaining, huge-hearted action-fantasy-comedy, a joyous ode to the multifaced wonder of life itself.
Yeoh plays Evelyn, a Chinese immigrant in America who runs a laundromat with her husband Waymond (Ke HuyQuan). Their marriage isn't exactly sparkling, and there is tension with their daughter Joy (Stephanie Hsu), who is hesitant to introduce them to her girlfriend.
While at the IRS to sort out their overdue taxes with a particularly vexing agent, played by Jamie Lee Curtis, Waymond suddenly switches personalities and tells Evelyn that he is an alternate universe version of Waymond who has come to warn her about an impending cataclysm. He explains that there is an expansive multiverse, and that it's possible for people to connect with their alternate selves, known as "verse-jumping", which allows someone access to skills their alternate self may have gained by taking a separate life path.
It transpires that an alternate version of Joy has become an insane, all-powerful being who plans to destroy the multiverse, and it's up to Evelyn and Waymond (and their various alternate selves) to stop her. But first Evelyn will have to learn to verse-jump, a process that can only occur after someone does something extremely unlikely. Which makes for a number of hilarious moments.
Propelled along by a set-up well timed for an audience familiar with the concept of a multiverse thanks to the recent Spider-Man film, Everything Everywhere All at Once is at the same time a wonderful showcase for Yeoh's wide-ranging abilities as a performer (as she incorporates elements of all Evelyn's alternate selves), and a deliriously entertaining sci-fi spectacle with multiple amazing action set pieces, many involving imaginatively-choreographed martial arts. You'll never look at a bumbag in the same way.
Written and directed by Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (known collectively as "Daniels"), the proclivity for icky gross-out humour revealed in their previous collaboration, Swiss Army Man (2016), shows up here, which caused my squeamish self to look away at times (paper cuts - no thanks!), but this is a minor complaint in a film positively bursting with cinematic possibilities and a clear love for humanity in all its forms.
As amazing as Yeoh is, it's equally fun seeing Ke Huy Quan (fondly remembered by 80s kids as Short Round from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Data from The Goonies) all grown up and back on the big screen showing just how dynamic and charming a performer he can be. Curtis is also clearly having a ball, and Hsu delivers a breakout performance full of surprises. Indeed, surprises are a rare commodity in modern cinema, and this movie is positively bursting with them.
Touching, ridiculous and funny in equal measure, you owe it to your soul to see this film.
Cast: Michelle Yeoh, Jamie Lee Curtis, Ke Huy Quan Directors: Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert Running time: 140 minutes Rating: R13 (Violence, offensive language, sexual references & content that may disturb) Verdict: The everything bagel of movies.
