Me And Earl And The Dying Girl

This review may contain spoilers!

A film that doesn't just tug on your heart strings but pulls out all the stops to rip them out. I would give Me And Earl And The Dying Girl a 9/10.

This film has an exceptionally paced narrative; it's slow at first with the heavy unpacking of character backstory but quickly moves to a very natural flow. In fact the plot in general is a strong story about character development, with a main protagonist who we really see grow as a person and learn how to find his place in the world while confronting themes of fitting in and death. The cinematography in the film is unpredictable; it moves in ways you just don't expect which really amazes and sets the film apart. The score and soundtrack are best described as quirky and unique; a perfect combination for the type of film that we are presented with.

RJ Cyler, who played Earl, is a very straight up performance; I like that he really confronted Greg and spoke the truth in his interactions with other characters. Olivia Cooke, who played Rachel, gave a very natural and grounded performance as her character progressed further into her cancer treatment; her emotional range went from one end of the spectrum to the other and it was nothing short of a powerful performance. Jon Bernthal, who played Mr McCarthy, was an entertaining role model figure; however the thing that really stood out for me was the scene in which he explained his father's death to Greg which is probably one of my favourite scenes of the film.

However the best performance came from Thomas Mann, who played Greg. What really works in Mann's performance is how we are first introduced to him as the main protagonist through his narration, we think he's quite worldly and confident. As the film progresses Mann strips this exterior away and we see how scared Greg is and how he lacks confidence in himself. Mann's entire performance circles around the awkward interactions he has with others and what comes of that; his chemistry with Cyler and Cooke is phenomenal. One of the best scenes of the film is when Cooke tells Mann she won't have any further treatment and we see the relationship between these two break down, it was a really powerful performance on both fronts.

One of the let downs of the film was the editing, there were a lot of incredible shots in this film that were let down by the simple cutting. The film had some great visuals but we lost them in places due largely to these editing problems.

Nick Offerman, who played Greg's Dad, was kind of cringe-worthy to watch onscreen; it was like he didn't know the line between where to play his role comically or dramatically. Connie Britton, who played Greg's Mom, had very little screen presence; yet I felt what was worse was that she had very little connection onscreen with Offerman or Mann. Molly Shannon, who played Denise, was kind of difficult to watch; I felt this way because her performance was all comedy which probably should have had a much sadder undertone that it ultimately did. Katherine C. Hughes, who played Madison, had very little screen presence and a role that was kind of unclear as to what her connection was with other characters; the sort of romance subplot between her and Mann felt extremely forced.