Scheduled for limited release on June 12, MAEATDG was previewed yesterday at the San Diego Cinema Society, of which I just became a member. Get your tickets now.
Me and Earl and the Dying Girl (Thomas Mann, Olivia Cooke, RJ Skylar, Connie Britton, Molly Shannon) – A touching and faithful adaptation of Jesse Andrews’ book, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl is a creative, inventive, and moving coming-of-age film that won the Grand Jury Prize and Audience Awards at Sundance.
The plot centers on Greg Gaines (Thomas Mann), a virtually invisible high school student who wants to play it safe by never getting on the wrong side of any of the dozens of cliques that make up adolescent society. His only friend (Greg calls him a co-worker) is Earl (RJ Skylar), a wisecracking kid and his partner in creating amateur films that spoof real movies (Midnight Cowboy becomes 2:48 pm Cowboy; Clockwork Orange becomes Sockwork Orange). The two hang out at lunch with a sane, but countercultural, teacher watching old foreign films. After all, the boys wouldn’t want to be in the cafeteria, which Greg thinks of as a virtual “Kandahar” where warring factions fight for turf.
Greg barely knows his fellow Schenley High classmate, Rachel (Olivia Cooke), who was recently diagnosed with leukemia. When Greg’s mother (played by Connie Britton) nags him into befriending Rachel, as only a Jewish mother can, he obliges but only to get mom to shut up. What starts out as an obligation turns into a real friendship.
If this were all there was to this film, it would devolve into a mushy, overly sentimental Juno or a tame Fast Times at Ridgemont High. Or it could be just the high school portion of Boyhood but it is far more than any of those.
It explores deeply the psyche of these characters, especially Greg and Rachel. He is hiding from the world, unable to admit he cares about people and even unable to call Earl a “friend.” She goes through the unimaginable, cutting herself off from the world as her illness ravages her. But all will be well, Greg assures us, who speaks directly to the audience as the narrator of the film to tell us not to worry … Rachel won’t die.
As the boys struggle mightily to make a movie just for Rachel, Greg abandons his schoolwork, gets rejected from college, and inadvertently makes an enemy at school. His safe, anonymous, unconnected world is clashing with real life at just the wrong time.
This apparently light, breezy film is suddenly becoming a melodrama for which the kids … and the audience … are unprepared. The rave of the Sundance Film Festival this year, MAEATDG could be the independent film of the year (from Fox Searchlight). It will make you laugh, cry, and want for more.
P.S. This is another movie that is set and filmed in my hometown, Pittsburgh. For those Pittsburghers on the distribution list, you will recognize lots of venues, including a magnificent shot through a house window of the Cathedral of Learning at Pitt. The writer of the novel and screenplay is a Pittsburgh native and graduate of Schenley High (which I believe is also where my father graduated from high school). In one scene, Greg wears a Monroeville Mall T-shirt. The mall is located less than two miles from my family’s home.