Love and Identity Crisis

  "Everything, Everywhere, All At Once”, starring Michelle Yeoh and Jamie Lee Curtis, is a critically acclaimed, action-packed 2022 film. At the 2023 Oscars, the movie won seven awards and is still talked about by many. I haven't heard a single bad thing about it, so it must be good, right? Now, I'm going to be completely honest, it was not what I expected, and I did have to read a few movie reviews to fully understand what I had watched, but it is filled with meaning and allows the viewer to look at life from a different perspective.

The movie captures the life of Evelyn, a Chinese immigrant, her husband, who she owns a laundromat with, and their daughter, Joy. In the beginning, Evelyn is clearly stressed about her business, it is taking all over her energy away from focusing on her family. On top of this, her elderly father lives with her and is constantly shaming her for her life choices, especially since she left China to start a family in America. Evelyn does not accept Joy for having a girlfriend and refers to her as a “he” rather than “she” to further show she does not want to accept her daughter as lesbian. The movie takes a twist when she is able to enter parallel universes. The adventurous film shows Evelyn connecting with different versions of her life, as the only person that is able to save her and her family from the powerful being, Jobu, representing Joy, who is struggling due to her estranged relationship with her mother. Jobu represents self-destruction and hardships.

Action. Packed. There was so much going on ‘all at once’ in this film it was hard to move my eyes from the screen. Within all of the actions, it was clear what the directors, Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, wanted to represent. Kindness. Acceptance. Identity. Love. Mental health. Generational trauma. So much being told in the two-and-a-half-hour-long movie that you certainly have to pay attention at all times when watching it. Although presented differently, the themes in “Everything, Everywhere, All At Once” are similar to that of Virginia Woolf’s novel, Mrs. Dalloway. Clarissa Dalloway reflects on her love for her friend, Sally, but homosexuality is not accepted during the 1920s when the book was based on it. Joy is in a relationship with Becky in the movie, but homosexuality is not necessarily accepted in Evelyn’s culture and upbringing which is why she has a hard time welcoming them as a couple into her house in the beginning. These generational norms shift into a form of trauma in the relationship between Evelyn and Joy. The mother and daughter relationship is often rocky, with disagreements and misunderstandings, but Evelyn is able to be Joy’s mentor, wise and guiding Joy through the multiverse. In Mrs. Dalloway, Clarissa and her daughter, Elizabeth, have a strained relationship, similar to the relationship between Evelyn and Joy at the beginning of the film. Although not the main focus of the book, their relationship represents the complexity of family life, and the desire for a mentor-mentee relationship with a mother, despite not necessarily expressing it. 

“Everything, Everywhere, All At Once” and Mrs. Dalloway, both represent the interconnectedness of people. Woolf uses stream-of-consciousness to represent this as well as mental illness. The pressures and effects of society are apparent in both and are shown when Evelyn is navigating the different universes, having to face consequences and make choices. 

It is truly a movie you have to see for yourself. It left me asking questions about my own life and truly reflecting on how I look at life in general. Be present and live in the moment. You can't change the past, but you can decide how you live in the future.