Review: Me and Earl and the Dying Girl

Director Alfonso Gomez-Rejon brings us the delightfully imaginative ME AND EARL AND THE DYING GIRL, penned by Jesse Andrews, which tells the story of a high school boy who befriends a girl with cancer.

Gregg (Thomas Mann) believes that a rodent-faced, awkward, annoying kid like him needs to be invisible in order to get by; so he's made it a point to make nice with everyone, getting "citizenship in every nation" as he calls it (being on the good side of every clique). He spends his lunch period in Mr. McCarthy (Jon Bernthal)'s office, hiding from the rest of the student body with his "coworker", Earl (RJ Cyler), with whom he makes rip-offs of classic movies in their spare time. But one day, his parents (Connie Britton and Nick Offerman) corner him into befriending Rachel (Olivia Cooke), a classmate who has just been diagnosed with leukemia, and he finds himself becoming visible.



The cast is loaded with recognizable faces -- a fact which usually indicates a weak story, but not in this case. While it does have that stereotypical arc of friends dealing with illness, the plot is defibrillated by the distinct collection of characters and creative nuances unique to their interactions. Gregg's mind is an imaginative funhouse of stop motion animation and innovative camera angles (specialty of cinematographer Chung-hoon Chung, whose work we've seen before in OLDBOY); Earl is the most laidback straight-shooter you could find in high school. Rachel's snarky attitude is the perfectly realistic defense mechanism of a girl who's just learned her condition. Offerman's play on Gregg's dad is charmingly ridiculous, as is Rachel's weirdly inappropriate mom, played by Molly Shannon.

Thomas Mann pulls off the quintessential teenager, masterfully executing the teenage humor that Andrews has so accurately portrayed throughout the script (the humor that stands on the edge of annoying and endearing); in fact, each member of the cast so innately becomes their own character that the film instantly comes to life on screen.

There are a few weak moments. There is a fight scene that feels forced -- like the story needed a moment of teenage angst to propel it to the next scene -- and there are a few lines that feel too fabricated to come from the mouths of teenagers. But all in all, ME AND EARL AND THE DYING GIRL is a great watch, versatile in its emotions and satisfactory in its conclusion. The film is now playing at Midtown Cinema -- don't miss it!