Consider this a challenge for long-term couples who appreciate the horror genre: Sit down with your partner and watch Together. This 2025 indie hit has now made its launch on a streaming platform on Hulu. On the surface, it could look like standard body horror, but within Together lies a intense contemplation about our choices in loving each other.
An Introductory Film Exploring Partnership Complexities
Together is the introductory feature for filmmaker Michael Shanks. It stars actors Alison Brie and Dave Franco as Tim and Millie, a pair who are not married that have been together for over ten years. Married in actuality in 2017, Franco and Brie contribute a particular energy to their roles, expertly portraying both the joys and frustrations of a committed partnership.
The story starts when the couple relocate from the metropolis to the country for professional reasons. A commonly used plot device, sure, but that’s mostly where the cliches end. Together evolves into as much a deep dive into the psyche of the pair’s relationship as it is a film about physical terror.
A Paranormal Spark
While hiking near their new home, a tempest descends, and the two tumble into an hole in the earth. After spending the night there and managing to escape, a mysterious influence begins influencing the couple. This force creates a paranormal intimacy between them that goes exceeding simple connection.
The entire film is a methodically building of scares, interspersing elements of fever-dream horrors, unsettling (but tastefully done) biological grotesqueries, and genuinely funny exchanges (sometimes amidst something grotesque). Michael Shanks orchestrates these parts neatly and presents them in a slowly mounting atmosphere of fear.
Nuanced Portrayals
A large part of Together is only Brie and Franco, and they skillfully illustrate countless layers to the partnership at the film's core. Her self-assurance and feeling of intimacy is waning due to a emotional and physical gap. Her underlying frustration of Tim for his hesitance to pursue anything but his struggling artistic pursuits inexorably rises.
Tim, on the other hand feels trapped and separated by Millie, who’s the impetus they’ve moved to the country and distant from his support system. He is terrified of the notion of completely losing his personal autonomy in another person. This fear is further exacerbated by the circumstance he does not operate a vehicle and relies on Millie for getting around.
The film's most intelligent aspect in this movie avoids making one partner or the other the clear bad guy.
Both characters face the type of challenges that come with long-term unions after ten years. At their core, they still love each other. They share moments of joy, comfort one another, and open up at times. But beneath it all, there’s an inescapable current of uncertainty about their future together.
Thematic Depth
While the supernatural forces in Together act as a metaphor for these concerns of excessive reliance and fully committing to a partner, the metaphor never feels overly obvious or pretentious. Instead, these more disturbing, unsettling scenes offer a brilliant analogue to the interpersonal storytelling. Both the supernatural and the personal enhance each other symbiotically.
A Controversial Conclusion
Together’s ending, which is best experienced firsthand, has sparked debate on the story's concluding statement about unhealthy partnerships. It has been said that unattached audience members have seen the movie as a powerful case for staying single. On the other hand, some couples who were in conflict found that the film actually helped them make up.
Whether you’re single or coupled up, your own response could function as a revealing measure of how you think about commitment. Will the ending sow anxiety and horror, or a uplifting feeling of optimism? Will you recognize your own traits in one of the characters and yell at the screen, or simply look at your significant other and say, “I’d do that for you”?
Whatever the case may be, Together is an exploration you can undertake today.
Together is available to watch on the streaming service Hulu now.
