Me Myself I (1999)

The road not taken

Who hasn't wondered what would have happened if they had taken a different romantic or professional path in some point in their distant past? This film is a delightful riff on that theme; it skillfully builds the narrative by creating an alternate life for the main character (excellently played by Rachel Griffiths) - a sort of Australian "Sliding Doors." I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the acting and production values. While the writing isn't scintillating, the film does a credible job of exploring perhaps the most often asked "what if": what if I had/had not settled down and become a wife and mother? Subtlety and originality are not strong suits, but the film was nevertheless consistently entertaining without sacrificing its sense of heartfelt empathy with both of Griffiths' characters. October 24, 2008

A little know gem

I caught this flick on cable a few years back and it always stayed with me. So, when I found it on Amazon for only five bucks I jumped at it.

The movie still holds up after all those years. Rachael Griffiths is great, and the story is timeless. It reminds me of another one of my favorites, "The Family Man" with Nicolas Cage.

If you're in the mood for a chick flick and have run through your collection, you won't be sorry if you add this one to the bunch. January 15, 2007

Great Movie

One of the best movies I've seen in a long time... addresses the question "what if" we had made other choices in our lives - How would our lives be different? What would stay the same?. I especially liked it because, unlike movies like "Family Man", it doesn't romanticize one path or another but rather shows the (realistic) highs and lows of being married vs. being single and how you can be happy with either life style. November 13, 2005

Great movie about parellel universes with the wonderful Rachel Griffiths!

If you discovered Rachel Griffiths on "Six Feet Under", or anywhere else for that matter, you know that she is a phenomenal actress with the ability to draw viewers in with her remarkable intensity. Few actresses can pull off a film like this one. Griffiths is in almost every single scene and yet we never get tired of seeing her. In fact, Griffiths is the kind of actress that intrigues you so much, that you cannot seem to stop watching her. Her beauty is strange. It's the kind that makes you wonder how she can be so plain one minute, yet so gorgeous the next. It's also the kind that exudes self-confidence while at the same time displaying incredible vulnerability.

The first time I saw this film it was aired on HBO after an episode of "Six Feet Under". At first, I thought the premise of the film might be a little too familiar. It almost seemed to echo IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE and the Gwenyth Paltrow sleeper SLIDING DOORS, but after it was over, I discovered that this movie had a warm feeling that was definitely unique. I won't go into details as there are plenty of recaps available, but I will say that the film is about what it would be like to see two different versions or yourself, making two completely different sets of choices for each one.

ME MYSELF I gives viewers the feeling that life can turn out fine no matter which road we take. That is a comforting thought in today's society. Too often we question our choices, assigning a definitive wrong or right to whatever it is that we're choosing. Maybe, if we learn the lesson this film teaches, we won't be so skeptical the next time we're at a crossroad. We might just take a chance...and that chance just might be as good as the one we passed up. September 19, 2005

Rachel Griffiths in a rather decent "road not taken" movie

"Me Myself I" is yet another example of a film where the hero/ine gets a chance to see the road not taken. Although we can trace this particular genre back at least to Dickens "A Christmas Carol," the cinematic epitome remains, of course, "It's a Wonderful Life," where Frank Capra puts Jimmy Stewart's George Bailey through the hell of a world in which he was never born. Sometimes the hero/ine gets a chance to live their life over again from a pivotal point (e.g., "Peggy Sue Got Married," "Mr. Destiny"), and sometimes they find themselves living a different life (e.g., "The Family Man"). "Me Myself I" is an example of the latter.

In "Me Myself I" it is Pamela Drury (Rachel Griffiths) who gets to see what might have been. She has made it to the age of 30 without getting married, writing for a magazine, smoking too much, and repeating glossing over the problems in her life by repeatedly telling herself the big lie, "I deserve the best and I accept the best." But when her happily married best friend has a baby, Pamela rethinks her life. Maybe she could have that too, even though she does not particularly like babies. She even meets a guy (Sandy Winton), but he turns out to be married. Suddenly, Pamela is having second thoughts about what happened all those years ago when she turned down Robert (David Roberts).

The next thing she knows, Pamela is not paying attention to where she is going as she agonizes over her life, and she gets hit by a car. However, the driver of the car turns out to be herself, that is to say, the one who married Robert all those many years ago. This seems a rather natural occurrence given their state of minds, and so Pamela switches places with Pamela. This gives our heroine one big advantage over most of the movie characters who end up in her position. She knows what she is heading into, even if she knows nothing about taking care of kids or what it means to toilet train a toddler. For once, the character enters the situations full of neither hope nor terror, but simply wanting to know if the road not taken lead to a better life.

Despite this twist, most of the scenes in this 1999 film are standard ones given the genre. Pamela has to roll with the punches as she learns about her husband, her children, and the life she never had. One of the nice things about writer-director Pip Karmel's script is that it deals with the realities of a marriage instead of the cutesy way a woman in Pamela's predicament usually has to find out about being a wife and a mom. There are some surprises in store as she finds out that Pamela's life is not perfect. Her look at the life she could have had answers questions, but raises more.

As is almost always the case, the success of this film rests on the performance of the main character. Griffiths has to carry most of the film and while Karmel does not come up with any big moments, the little ones suffice. "Me Myself I" is not as deep as it might be, and you can interpret the lessons any way you want, but it seems to lead to the inevitable if not obvious conclusion that you should never be so busy with your life that you do not bother to live it. Like the double main character in "Sliding Doors," both Pamelas are living their lives at the same time, but we stick with the one we started with through the main part of the film. But I cannot help but wonder what the married Pamela thought about the life she could have lived. Again, there is more to explore here than the film actually explores, which just underscores why this genre continues to persist to this day and beyond. November 16, 2004

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