The We and the I (2013)
Average Rating: 6.6/10
Reviews Counted: 39
Fresh: 26 | Rotten: 13
Michel Gondry's whimsical dramedy is occasionally unfocused, but it's still an imaginative and poignant take on the emotional complexities of young people.
Average Rating: 6/10
Critic Reviews: 12
Fresh: 6 | Rotten: 6
Michel Gondry's whimsical dramedy is occasionally unfocused, but it's still an imaginative and poignant take on the emotional complexities of young people.
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Average Rating: 3.3/5
User Ratings: 839
Movie Info
Workshopped with a group of teens from The Bronx over the course of 3 years, Michel Gondry's The We and The I gives an inside look into the dynamics, drama and hilarity that emerge on a real-time bus ride through The Bronx on the last day of school. -- (C) Paladin Films
Cast
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Michael Brodie
Michael -
Teresa Lynn Eyet
Teresa -
Laidychen Carrasco
Laidychen -
Raymond Delgado
Little Raymond -
Jonathan Ortiz
Jonathan -
Jonathan Worrell
Big T -
Alex Barrios
Alex -
Meghan "Niomi" Murphy
Niomi -
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-
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All Critics (39) | Top Critics (12) | Fresh (26) | Rotten (13)
Credit Gondry, like Tocqueville before him, with at least re-examining tired clichés and scraping the rust off stereotypes.
Top CriticAn occasionally interesting glimpse into the lives of a diverse group of urban teens and their struggles, but also a film that's overly long and often annoying.
All of the kids are good in their roles, mostly as characters one assumes resemble themselves. And as any actor will tell you, playing yourself is one of the toughest gigs around.
Gondry has talent, and I think he enjoyed being with these youngsters, but the film suffers in trying to impose something vaguely like a story on a framework that boils down to teen high jinks during a bus ride.
"The We and the I" is a collection of very thin stories, many of which feel incomplete.
Organic interactions are interrupted by Gondry's words, or abandoned in favor of fantasy sequences. The film's verisimilitude too often takes a backseat to conventional storytelling and Gondry's whimsical aesthetic.
Michel Gondry, working with nonprofessional actors, takes this one-location setup and-traffic conditions permitting-takes off.
Gondry is like a DJ scratching a record. He puts his own touches to the sound of the Bronx while staying true to its beat.
Gondry's film is like a huge community, alive and -- despite a layer of protective swagger -- full of sympathy and love.
An artful, scrambled, energetic blend of youthful connection and hormonally charged carousing [that] works more as a caffeinated conveyance of feeling than an actual plotted story.
French director Michel Gondry takes a select group of Bronx teenagers, puts them on a bus, and lets them loose. For some of us, it's a scary ride.
Gondry captures some intermittent compelling moments, but overall the film lacks much depth or insight.
The We and the I is less a film than a social-studies experiment, an after-school project by a bunch of high-school kids exploring that eternal teen tension between the individual and the group.
Imagine a student video project with professional production values.
By the end of the line, we've been granted a privileged peek at today's youth that's intimidating and nostalgia-inducing in equal measure.
Realistic look at teen culture has drinking, sex, language.
Exuberantly finds the universality of adolescence. . . [in] a running theme of. . .peers vs. individual--how 1 plus 1 equals 3, when in groups, they become like someone else.
Michel Gondry gets back to his low-budget roots and rediscovers his formidable formal playfulness in the process.
Ambition only carries the viewing experience so far, as most of the effort is strangled by a persistent unpleasantness and Gondry's tone-deaf way with establishing sympathy for this public transit motley crew.
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Movie: ID: 771307426 Title: The We and the I Release Date: 2013-03-08 00:00:00.0 MPAA: 6 Status: 1
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I do admire the risks that director Gondry often takes with his art. He is by far one of the most talented music video directors around and his films like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and The Scinece of Sleep has shown great innovation and talent. The We and the I is more closer to his critically acclaimed documentary Blockparty, which i myself did not care that much.
There is a moment in this film where things do shape up into a more coherent storyline and all the yelling and bullying steps aside, but that moment comes way too late. For the first hour into this film i just felt annoyed and did not like any of these characters that much. They all just seem to to be bullies with smartmouth and the way they treat each other and passengers is quite harsh and insulting. I did not find no sympathy towards them. In the final fifteen minutes things do luckily go much better direction when Gondry finally forces his characters to look into a mirror. I still think that it all came way too late to make any difference at that point.
There are moments that has raw hypnotic power in them but mostly this is just chaotic mess from Gondry.