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This new British film, cowritten and starring Brett Goldstein, postulates a near future where the algorithms on dating apps have gone a step further and it is now possible to take a test that will tell you who your soulmate is. I am a fan of Goldstein’s script collaborations; Ted Lasso is one of my favourite shows and Shrinking has a huge amount of charm. (I’m not so sure about the Catherine Tate Nan Movie though.) What he is so good at is showing the idiosyncrasies and complexities of human relationships and it is this where All of You really excels. The light sci-fi conceit is actually largely irrelevant here, it just sets up the idea of who might be your right or wrong partner that the rest of the film spins off from. (Here he is writing with director William Bridges who having worked on Black Mirror and Stranger Things might be the one bringing the advanced technology twist to proceedings.)

The plot follows Goldstein’s Simon and Imogen Poots’ Laura who started their close friendship at university and are revisited in the narrative at various points in their lives moving on from this. In this it echoes elements of One Day and When Harry Met Sally as we wonder whether they will get together as a couple over this extended time, but it still feels totally like its own thing. 

There is always an honesty in the way Goldstein examines how people get on with one another but here it steps up and the comedy he normally also brings takes strong second place. It is not a great spoiler to say that the friends do hook up at one point but the cafe scene that follows is so different from the parallel moment in the famous 1989 Meg Ryan/Billy Crystal film. The way the guilt and blame comes to the fore at this point is fascinating and brilliantly authored. This is just one example of many of the raw verisimilitude demonstrated throughout and it is all utterly compelling. Goldstein and Poots totally sell the complex relationship these two have and their chemistry is incredible. 

Moving as the movie is though, I am not sure it is entirely satisfying. They are off and on across a lot of the running time and as such the resolution it comes to doesn’t feel like a genuine ending. Short of one of them dying it is hard to know how there could be a conclusive denouement to this, although I am glad to say this is not something it has in common with One Day. In many respects they are also a very frustrating pair but I recognise that is real life.

Considering that this couple supposedly met at university the clear age gap is a little distracting too. Granted Goldstein is only nine years older and he could have been a mature student but if she was 18 and he was 27 at the start then this does feel consistent with the story. To rationalise this it could be that he is playing half a decade younger and her half a decade up and actually the movie probably covers a period of at least ten years with neither of them looking any different save beard and hair length respectively so maybe I should let it go. 

All of You is not perfect then but it is incredibly powerful, brilliantly acted and yes, mostly superbly written. I thought I’d seen it all from the trailer but actually I hadn’t as there a lots of treats hidden within. With some provisos then, this is definitely recommended. 

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The Ripley Factor:

This section of my reviews where I examine the representation of women in films is now only an occasional inclusion largely because this doesn’t need the same discussion that it did only two years ago. In this case though there is something to say as while the characterisation does feel incredibly honest and realistic, it still comes across as two men writing for a woman. Poots brings a huge amount of authenticity but I wonder how Laura might have been differently portrayed otherwise. We rarely meet her away from Simon and some of her motivations could have been a bit less two dimensional. Certainly as a two hander, which it clearly wants to be, it could have been better balanced.