The Half of it Review (2020) – A quirky coming of age journey through high school angst, unrequited love, and friendship!

We are sad to be wrapping up this month, but we decided to watch a movie that we had not seen before! It is a bit of a strange one, "The Half of It" (2020). A coming-of-age romantic comedy that promises a fresh take on the classic “Cyrano de Bergerac” story... but with a twist! It is a bit of a basic and overdone storyline but we still found the movie to be cute!

Some trigger warnings before we get into it for: racism, homophobia, deception, manipulation, religion and grief. We found that the movie was relatively mild in regards to some of these but it is still worth noting and being aware of.

The movie begins with some decent animation and a voice over from our main character Ellie Chu (Leah Lewis), depicting how the Ancient Greeks, particularly Plato, viewed love and soul mates. Their idea was that at one time in history we were connected to our soul mate, as in literally, physically attached to them. Because of this, humans were viewed as too happy by the gods. The gods split us all apart so we would not be too happy and forget to worship them…sounds about right.

So we live lives of searching and longing, looking for our other half and when we find our soul mate we will be endlessly happy. While it is a sweet notion, we always support love, and we potatoes feel fortunate that we found each other…at the same time though, this story is ancient for a reason.

It is sweet, but definitely not based in reality. Happiness is subjective and differs a lot from person to person! Happiness is not so black and white. There are a million ways to be happy and to live a happy life! This does not always include a partner and that is more than ok! The important thing is that at the end of the day, you are at peace with yourself and your life. But we digress!

We fade to a high school for a quick moment and two teens kissing and walking away from each other. Ellie seems to be jaded in regards to love, which is completely understandable! Human relationships are complicated and often messy.

We see Ellie working on some papers on these Ancient Greek (Plato) ideas of love. She is writing essays for multiple people in her classroom and selling them to make some money. She is clearly incredibly bright and hardworking.

Next, we see her start getting ready to head out for school. As she is leaving her house she covers an older man, slumped, and asleep with a blanket. It’s clear that he is her Dad, Edwin Shu (Collin Chou). She then starts checking off a list of what looks like household responsibilities. This is our first glimpse into Ellie’s parentified life outside of school.

She heads out of the house, which is next to the train station or is the train station? As she rides her bike to school, she passes the city sign for Squahamish a small town in Washington State.

Heading into town we pass an old man that looks like a priest based on what he is wearing, out on his front deck spewing religious nonsense into the void? No one is there to listen to him so it is a bit strange.

 As she continues her bike ride into town, a car passes Ellie and the people within the car proceed to make fun of her last name, “Ellie Chu! Chugga chugga Chu Chu!”

We potatoes could not roll our eyes harder. Ellie ignores it and just keeps peddling because what else is she going to do. We get it, but it sucks to have to watch her put up with the bullshit when she should not be subjected to it in the first place.

We fade from there to a school choir/band class. They are warming up and Ellie is sitting at the piano. The teacher begins class with a few announcements, one of them being about the mandatory talent show…sounds like a nightmare to us…mandatory?? What? No thank you!

Moving on, while the teacher is talking we see Ellie start to subtly pass around the essays she wrote for a good number of the students. They Venmo her the money as soon as they get their essay and each essay is in a labeled folder so each student that is cheating knows which one is theirs.

It is an interesting system for sure, and while we do not love cheating at all…we have to give Ellie some respect for her entrepreneurial spirit and her ability to spit out so many well written essays! It’s impressive!

As the papers are being discretely passed around the classroom, we linger on an obnoxious boy named Trig Carson (Wolfgang Novogratz), talking about himself to his friend, and a young woman, Aster Flores, (Alexxis Lemire) sitting next to him. He has his arm around her indicating that they are together.

Aster is busy reading a book and not paying attention to the room. One of us potatoes in particular can relate strongly to this…reading through class was our favorite pastime much to the annoyance of our teachers.

The teacher asks the choir to stand up to get the class started. Someone in the band starts playing some music and Aster starts singing. She has a nice voice, and Ellie is watching her intently.

We fade from the band room to the field outside with Ellie’s voice over breaking the fourth wall saying that, “this is not a love story.”

A young man, Paul Munsky (Daniel Diemer), stops during P.E. to listen to the singing. He is enchanted as well.

Cut to a busy hallway with Ellie staring at the talent show sign ups, MANDATORY FOR SENIORS it says in large red letters. She hesitantly signs up.

We then cut to a philosophy class that is wrapping up. Ellie walks up to the teacher’s, Mrs. Geselschap (Becky Ann Baker), desk to turn in her paper. “Six different takes on Plato. Impressive.”

Ellie denies it but Mrs. Geselschap not only knows, but does not really care. She is pleased to read well written essays instead of what the other students would actually write. Incredibly silly, but funny. We like her, Mrs. Geselschap is quirky. Do we think she is a good teacher? Not necessarily.

Mrs. Geselschap is doing the other students that she knows are cheating, a disservice. They are not going to learn much of anything from the class if they are never doing their own work or their own thinking…this is especially crucial in a philosophy class! Critical thinking and questioning the world is a big part of the point!

Admittedly, we do feel that some teachers forget that a lot of things are subjective, and just because you, the teacher, may view something differently does not make the student wrong. But we need to move forward!

Mrs. Geselschap passes Ellie an application to a college called Grinnell in Iowa. Ellie is not looking to leave the state and has decided that she will be going to the University of Washington. She will get a full ride if she goes there, and she will get to stay home!

Why this is a problem with her teacher is kind of odd to us…she is going to go to college and UW is a good school as far as we are aware! She can likely get the degree she wants from there just as easily as anywhere else and a full ride is amazing!

Mrs. Geselschap is not pleased with this, she hates Squahamish and does not want Ellie to stay there. Understandable to a point…that is if Mrs. Geselschap is aware of the parentification occurring at home. But there is nothing to indicate that she knows anything about that!

The whole thing is weird. Ellie teases Mrs. Geselschap and leaves the classroom to head home. Back on her bike and peddling quickly she is making impressive time on her way back to the train station.

Of course the same assholes from before pass her in their car, and yell the same damn insult at her. AGAIN. Eye roll.

Paul jogs up to Ellie and stops her bike by grabbing it from behind. Annoyed Ellie demands to know what is wrong with him! He awkwardly apologizes and pulls out a piece of paper from his backpack.

Ellie assumes that he wants her to write some essay’s for him and starts listing off her price options. Paul is not interested in cheating, but he does want her to look over a letter he has written to Aster!

Ellie is not comfortable with this at all! She feels it is wrong, and letters need to be personal and authentic. She turns him down and encourages him to get a thesaurus.

Cut to the evening, it is dark and Ellie is sitting in her living room with her Dad. She is working on school work while they watch a classic black and white film together.

The lights flicker…she turns to her dad and asks him in Mandarin if he called the power company. He responds with, “They don’t understand my accent.”

“Did you try?”

He shushes her for the “best part” of the movie. He quotes the movie in what sounds to us like fairly fine English! Yes, he has an accent, but he speaks just fine to our hearing! He just needs a little more practice and he’ll be doing great!

We felt irritated for Ellie, she is a child and should not have to be concerned with whether or not she has access to electricity in her own home. We know that this is the case for many, and it sucks.

Ellie tells him she will make the call tomorrow. She also seems to be doing most of her dad’s actual work at the train station as well…it is all more than a little messed up.

Next day she calls the electric company on her way to school while biking…sigh. She wants an extension for their light bill and she is placed on hold. She is still on hold when she gets school and remains on hold for hours!

She is literally juggling classes and such, while on hold. While she is walking down the busy hallways, someone knocks into her and drops everything in her arms. We get our meet cute with Aster here, she helps Ellie pick up her papers and phone.

Ellie finally gets off of hold, and is informed that their bill is three months overdue and if they are not able to pay a minimum payment of fifty dollars they will terminate their power tomorrow!

Paul happens to show up right then and Ellie tells him that she will write a letter for him for fifty dollars but after that he is on his own and thus begins the Cyrano plot! We all know what happens here, Ellie says she will only help him with one letter…but of course it ends up being many, many letters as well as texting and more!

The deception deepens, it gets out of hand, and feelings get very tangled and confusing for all involved! We love the representation in this film, but truth be told, the friendship between Ellie and Paul is the best part of the movie! Watching them help each other, and grow in their friendship is really cute and sweet. We love their friendship and we love Paul’s taco idea!

While we did appreciate this film, the pacing was a bit slow, and the movie is highly predictable. It does touch on some real issues, but they do tend to dance around them which was a bit frustrating!

We dance around the parentification, racism, the religious trauma caused by living in such a small and deeply religious town while being part of the LGBTQ+ community, etc. We wish that the film spent more time on these things and not as much time on the letters!

We really feel for Ellie. She is a tremendously smart, compassionate and kind person. She is stuck in a town where she cannot truly be herself and she is just trying to get through her days. She works hard for her Dad and does the best she can with the hand that she has been dealt. She honestly works too hard. Her dad is clearly struggling and Ellie has to make up the difference. It is unfair, but it is unfortunately not uncommon.

There are many ways that a child can be parentified. We did not experience exactly what Ellie did in the film, but we have experienced parentification. It can have difficult and lasting effects on a person. The film does highlight it, but it does not delve that deeply into it. The plot is still far too focused on the classic, and predictable Cyrano story-line with a modern twist.

Again we liked this film! But we felt that there was more that could have been done with it! It felt like they kept teasing you with the potential for real depth but never quite getting you where you want to go. It's as if the movie is afraid to fully commit, tiptoeing around important conversations like a ballet dancer in a minefield!

It is still a fun movie, and there's plenty of awkward humor and endearing moments to keep you engaged. Whether it's Ellie's dry wit and deadpan delivery or the mishaps that ensue with Paul, you'll find yourself laughing along! But it could have been so much better! The pacing could have been better and the overall story could have been improved upon as well!

Overall we like the movie and we had fun with it! We love the representation, and we like Cyrano de Bergerac! We have seen many film adaptations of it. The drinking game does make it a little more fun but we still enjoy the film with or without. We recommend watching it if you like a slow burn, dry humor, quirky characters, representation and a sweet but predictable story!

We give this movie 3 out 5 Corona Beer’s!

The Half of It Drinking Game

Take a sip anytime:

1.     There's an awkward situation on screen

2.     Ellie is parentified

3.     Ellie is called a nerd

4.     Someone bullies Ellie

5.     Ellie rides her bike

6.     Ellie and Paul discuss the letters

7.     Paul is silly or dumb

8.     Paul is sweet

9.     Paul runs behind or next to Ellie's bike

10.  Paul talks about sausages

11.  Anyone creeps on Aster

12.  There are text messages on screen

13.  Dad says "Best Part"

14.  Trig is egotistical

15.  Paul talks about sausages

16.  There's a quote on screen

What did you think?? Did you like the movie? Did you hate it!? Do you have suggestions for films we should watch?! Any and all thoughts are welcome! Let us know here in the comments and always remember to be safe and drink responsibly!