Body horror is having a moment right now. For the first time in over three decades, the genre made a huge showing at the Oscars, with Coraline Fargeat’s The Substance getting the most awards recognition for the genre since David Cronenberg’s The Fly. Demi Moore was considered an awards season frontrunner for a role in which she morphs into a deformed creature called Elisasue Monstro. Body horror had never been more mainstream, which is why it’s no surprise that some of the best horror movies of the year so far have been innovating with the genre in unprecedented ways. So why not marry a millennial rom-com with a body-horror thriller?
Together, Michael Shanks’ feature directorial debut starring Alison Brie and Dave Franco as a couple whose move to a remote cottage leads to a supernatural encounter that morphs their relationship in extreme ways, sounds like it could be an obnoxious combination of genres. But miraculously, Together balances on the tonal tightrope between true body-horror movie and wry rom-com, delivering a terrifically goopy thriller on the perils of codependent relationships that’s equal parts funny, surprisingly moving, and flat-out gross.
