After The Fault in Our Stars, you’d figure there’d be no ground to cover in the coming-of-age-except-I-have-cancer-and-might-die-soon genre. But while Fault shakes its audience and yells “YOU WILL FEEL ALL THE SADNESS” into every eardrum, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl finds pleasure in making you laugh. And when that laughter loosens you up, that’s when the film goes for the gut punch.
Greg (Thomas Mann) is the titular Me, a strategically reclusive teenager who calls his best friend (RJ Cyler), the titular Earl, a “co-worker” in order to feel distant from him. They’re both a little weird and misunderstood, like the cultish arthouse films they remake with hilariously bad results.
When Greg is forced to befriend Rachel, the titular Dying Girl (Olivia Cook), he cannot ignore the genuine friendship that unfolds. But this sweet bond doesn’t magically ‘fix’ either of them: she’s still got leukaemia and he’s still an awkward dumbass.
Greg and Earl are pressured into making a film for her, but this situation doesn’t make them talented filmmakers either. Every obvious cliché is dodged, giving the film a genuineness that makes the comedy funnier and the heartbreaks more unbearable.
Cyler and Cook make for charming co-leads with damn fine comedic turns from Jon Bernthal, Nick Offerman and especially Molly Shannon as Rachel’s chardonnay-swigging mum. But this is Greg’s story to tell, with Mann’s on-point performance working in tandem with director Alfonso Gomez-Rejon’s off-the-wall approach.
From gorgeously unusual camera movements to sporadic uses of stop-motion, the seemingly jumbled choices in style match Greg’s own jumbled inability to tell the story. Very few coming-of-age films reflect the creative chaos of a teenage mind as vividly, and even fewer portray the value of friendship as strongly.
‘Me and Earl and the Dying Girl’ Movie Times
Want More Films Like It? We Suggest:
The Fault in Our Stars | Dope | The Perks of Being a Wallflower | Boyhood
