“Everything everywhere and at once” begins with a window to the daily struggles of the everyday woman. Evelyn Wang (Michelle Yeo) is under pressure from all sides: the IRS is auditing her business, she and her husband Weymond (Ke Hui Quan) may be divorcing, she is struggling to find out her older daughter Joy (Stephanie Hsu), and she takes care of his aging and disapproving father (James Hong).
One version of this film could be a home drama that follows our exhausted and overwhelmed protagonist through the carcass of her precarious life. But in the hands of Swiss Army Man directors Daniel Quan and Daniel Scheinert, the brave and resourceful duo known as Daniels, something wild will happen. The family meets with a lively IRS auditor, Deirdre (Jamie Lee Curtis). Weymond – or an alternative version of it, as we soon learn – gives Evelyn some instructions written hastily on the back of one of their tax forms. She follows instructions that unlock her ability to enter a series of alternate universes. What if she hadn’t married Weymond and left China with him? What other lives could she live? She jumps between different versions of herself in different and increasingly crazy universes, taking her – and us – on a wild, almost psychedelic journey.
“I was so intrigued and so struck by the fact that these two young men had written a story about an older woman – an older, immigrant Asian mother – and in fact gave her superpowers at the end of the day,” Yeo said, describing the first. the time he read Daniels’ screenplay. “She’s like a superhero because she says all the universes support the family together. That they had the audacity, the courage, the courage to write this. If you look around us, when was the last time you saw an older woman be a superhero?
Luckily for us, this film not only gives the legendary Yeo a chance to be a superhero, but also builds an entire cinematic universe of Michel Yeo. We pay tribute to everything from “2001: A Space Odyssey” to “In the Mood for Love.” We get a variety of genres and moods: science fiction, action, adventure, film noir – and yes, gentle home drama. One of the beauties of the film is that wrapped in dizzying chaos, there is a tale of a family of Chinese immigrants who are just trying to cope, a mother and daughter trying to unlearn their trauma between generations and how to find joy in times when nothing seems to matter.
“It’s about the story of a very ordinary family, isn’t it?” And then it became extraordinary, “Yeo said. “At the end of the day, the humanity of what it was was paramount. You do not give up. You are not giving up on your family. You do not give up your love in any universe and wherever you go, you go around looking for each other. ”
At the heart of the film’s tenderness is the main family unit, played by a unique group of actors, each of whom brings their diverse careers into their roles. Hsu made his feature film debut after working steadily in theater and television. Quan, who became known as a children’s star in the 1980s in “The Goonies” and “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom”, returned to acting at the age of 50. He graduated from the Hong family, a veteran journeyman actor with over 400 film and television credits. At 93, he continues to work prolifically. He playfully admitted that when he read the script, “it didn’t make much sense, you know, to jump from one universe to another or anything.” It is very confusing. And I didn’t try to figure it all out, because, you know, it’s going to take a long time.
Each actor accepted the challenge to play multiple versions of his characters. For example, Quan had to switch between ordinary Weymond; Alpha Wymond, an action hero who destroys enemies by throwing away his backpack; and kind CEO Weymond. Before filming, he got involved in training by hiring an acting coach, a dialogue coach, a voice coach and a body movement coach.
“From the very beginning, it was very important for me for the audience to be able to tell who is who by their standing, walking, moving and talking,” Kuan said. “The body movement coach will read the script and choose specific animals to do. For Weymond, it was a squirrel. For Alpha Waymond, it was the eagle, and CEO Weymond was a fox. I would spend countless hours on YouTube just watching these animals move, fly, eat and all. ”
The chaos in the film can sometimes be overwhelming. But again and again he returns to his main family history of Asian immigrants. I found deep consolation in how the film felt, due to the lack of a better description, extremely Asian. I felt so at home listening to the characters switch between Mandarin, Cantonese, English and Chinglish, sometimes using multiple languages and dialects even in one sentence – the way many immigrant families speak to each other. In a similar way, I felt deep in my bones the difficult relationship between Evelyn and Joy, the struggle to appreciate the sacrifices our immigrant parents have made, while outlining our own paths, and I hope our parents understand.
“It was amazing to talk to Asian women specifically about the mother-daughter relationship, because everyone says, ‘I get it,'” Hsu said. “I can feel your heart, even through this Zoom. I say to myself, “Oh, hell, yes, you understand,” and I don’t even have to explain because you understand and you’ve been there.
“Oh my God,” Hsu said of a cathartic scene between Evelyn and Joy at the end of the film. “I’m just straight, like, crying ugly. I just really wanted to let it all hang. I just wanted to be as honest as possible about this very deep kind of trauma between the generations and the deep desire to express love and not know how to do it. “
Yeoh began to appreciate the appeal of the film for many generations. For the younger generations, the film is “largely their world: fast and furious, chaos and all that, isn’t it?” She said. “They understand it – and then they say, ‘I’m going to call my mother.'”
For Quan, “Everything Everywhere and All at Once” represents several moments from a complete circle. One of them is the fact that Yeoh is a great reason to return to acting. The success of Crazy Rich Asians in 2018, the first Hollywood studio film since The Joy Luck Club in 1993, which included a majority of Asian actors – including Yeo as matriarch Eleanor Young – convinced him that things might be the best. -they finally get better. After gaining some recognition as a child in the 1980s, Kuan left acting when he reached adulthood, demoralized by a shortage of roles for Asian actors.
“I was in my early 20s and all I did was wait for the phone to ring. It was rare – and when he did, it was to audition for a role in which there were only two lines. It was a time when it was very discouraging to be an Asian actor, “he said. “So for me, here, talking to you today, this was certainly not planned. That wasn’t the game’s plan, like, “Yeah, I’ll be back in acting when I’m 50.”
The beauty of this film is that Quan became an action star and a romantic starring role that could not return in the 90s of last century. In one of the alternate universes, Evelyn is a movie star (a clever meta moment involving real shots from the red carpet of Yeo herself). At the premiere, movie star Evelyn notices CEO Weymond, the one who escaped. The gorgeous scenes are framed just like something from a Wong Kar-wai movie. From a distance, CEO Weymond looks awfully much like Wong’s frequent collaborator, Hong Kong star Tony Leung.
This is also a moment of complete circle for Quan. After leaving acting, he graduated from film school at the University of Southern California and then worked behind the camera in various roles as a stunt coordinator and choreographer of the fight in “X-Men” and “The One”. For years, he also worked with Wong, including as his assistant director on 2046.
Now, instead of watching Leung behind the camera of one of Wong’s masterpieces, Quan had to “walk the set and be in that suit with his hair pulled back,” he said. “Being able to be a part of this homage to the great master himself was really sweet.”
In the four years since Crazy Rich Asians, Asian screen performances, while still limited in many ways, are slowly but surely becoming more common and diverse. Each major film or role for an Asian actor lays the groundwork for the next. Hsu has just shot a comedy directed by Crazy Rich Asians co-writer Adele Lim, which will be released later this year. This is the culmination of a journey that began with her groundbreaking role in the musical “Be cooler”And progressed to television roles in“ The Wonderful Mrs. Meisel ”and“ Awkwafina Is Nora From Queens ”.
“I came from the world of doing experimental theater in the center,” Hsu said. “I feel like I’ve somehow managed to sneak through the back door and make a film with a bunch of strangers that I’m sure will appeal to so many people and be a cult classic that they teach in film school.”
Quan is currently filming the Disney + adaptation of the graphic novel “Native American Chinese”, also starring Yeoh. He hopes that this moment, unlike in the 1990s, is not a breakthrough, but a real transformation.
“It simply came to our notice then. It may not be moving as fast as we want, but with all the sustainable improvements, it’s happening gradually. My return to acting is a direct result of some of the progress made by Asian talent working in Hollywood today. I remember meeting many of them over the years, and they always say, “Ke, thank you, man.” You are OG. Thank you for paving the way for us to be here. What’s really interesting is that they also paved the way for my return. “
“My return proves how important it is not only for Asians, but for everyone to be represented in the fun, because until it happens, you just can’t imagine that it could be you up there on the screen,” he continued. “I can’t imagine how many others like me, young and old, share the same dream that has been dormant for many years. So, if you ask me what I hope our film does, I really hope “Everything Everywhere and All” does for these dreamers what “Crazy Rich Asians” did for me. That would make me really happy. “
“Everything Everywhere and Everything At Once” is already being played in selected cinemas and will premiere in a wide show on April 8.