"Well, it sounds to me like you complete each other."
Fantasia International Film Festival
The real-life husband and wife play an unmarried couple, Tim and Millie, who move from the city to the remote countryside after ten years together. This major life change puts pressure on their already strained relationship. After encountering a strange occurrence in the woods that triggers a past traumatic incident, their bodies become inexplicably physically drawn and subsequently fused together, slowly combining to become one. It's both an obvious but smart encapsulation of the stresses of any long-term romantic partnership or commitment.
As its title slyly implies, Together plays with its gnarly, physical horror as a byproduct of the complacent characters' unhealthy intimacy issues manifesting themselves. They recognize they should probably break up, as one of them readily admits it will only be harder the longer they wait, and that Tim clearly needs Millie more than she needs him. It's impressive how spare Shanks constructs the film with few characters or locations, while Damon Herriman as Brie's coworker strikes the perfect balance between nice and creepy.
Franco and Brie make Together a compelling yet gross body horror experience blended with an earnest relationship drama. Shanks' slow but patient eye builds a similar but more intimate atmosphere to something in the vein of last year's The Substance. It's a terrifically inventive cult thriller that impressively doubles as an unhinged romance.
Together screened at the 2025 Fantasia International Film Festival in Montreal.
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