Lawrence.com

Lately there has been a series of indie movies contemplating how people go through life detached from their feelings and everything around them.

Me, You and Everyone We Know is another one of those movies. Director, writer and star Miranda July, plays Christine Jesperson. Christine is a lonely woman with a One Hour Photo-esque art project she works on when she's not chauffeuring around the elderly. Meanwhile, Richard Swersey, played by John Hawkes, is getting divorced from his wife and trying to be a father to his two sons. Richard is out of touch with life (to let us know how far from his feelings he is, one of the first things we see him do is lighthis own hand on fire and watch it burn). Our two main characters are alienated and at odds with the world around them. But we like it that way.

The children play a large part in this movie as well - Peter and Robby, Richard's sons, along with some girls from the neighborhood, Heather, Rebecca and Sylvie, share the screen with the adults. They at first appear naive and innocent. We find they're not so innocent, and you sense they don't know exactly what they are doing and it seems there's no one to help them figure it out. Still, it helps give the movie some much needed humor. Young Robby's involved in an internet "relationship" and Sylvie has an obsession with appliances.

One problem with some smaller pictures is that the writer tries to make the characters too unique, making it hard to relate to them. Luckily that didn't happen here. Sure everyone is a little off beat, but you can find a little of yourself in all of them. The dialogue, such as that comparison between a walk down a street and a relationship, is wonderfully conceived. The film never becomes too wordy, and the words never get in the way of people's actions. These scenes don't need words to explain them.

This movie has a plot idea that you've seen before, but the characters make it worth the trip. You leave the theater hoping that Christine and Richard make it together and that their screwed up lives get just a little bit easier. In the last scene a man is tapping a coin on a pole. When Robby asks the man why, he says it's just to pass the time. So much of life can be just "passing the time," but watching this movie isn't.