Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #43927 in DVD
• Released on: 2003-06-17
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Formats: Anamorphic, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 107 minutes

Amazon.com
Friendship can prove more complicated than romance. Me Without You follows two British girls from their 1970s preadolescence to contemporary adulthood. Holly (Michelle Williams, Dick), a shy Jewish girl with loving but bookish parents, grew up next to Marina (Anna Friel, The Land Girls), whose glamorous but unstable parents render her flamboyant but a mess inside. The girls form an alliance, each envying the other and finding solace in the relationship, but over time, they sabotage as much as support each other, sometimes at the same time. Both have an affair with a randy college professor (Kyle MacLachlan), but it's Holly's attraction to Marina's older brother Nat (Oliver Milburn) that, in the end, forces the women to redefine their lives. Me Without You is excellently performed and full of telling details. Though the heroines are often confused, the movie has a lucid clarity that is compassionate but open-eyed. --Bret Fetzer

Customer Reviews

Clever and Powerful. A must!
Friendships can be odd. And I have never seen a more realistic friendship depicted on film than that of Marina and Holly in the engrossing and powerful "Me Without You." The film brilliantly reveals a less tidy, more insidious version of 'friends forever', one in which undying loyalty coexists with cruelty and subterfuge.

There's no question the friendship between affection-starved man-eater Marina (Anna Friel) and studious Holly (Michelle Williams) will spin out of control. The script by Goldbacher and Laurence Coriat paints Marina as spiteful from puberty on, her deceptions growing more vicious and unbelievable as the picture moves from the pair's 1970s girlhood into young adulthood. Goldbacher is adept at visual storytelling, capturing intimate moments with breathtaking acuity. She's also got a couple of spirited actresses in her corner.

Williams drops her "Dawson's Creek" persona immediately, mastering a middle-class English accent and kindly, mousy demeanor. The actress' manner fits a girl whose mother has told her, by way of comfort, "Some girls are pretty, and some are smart." Her performance is touching, heartfelt, and certainly eye-opening. She is truly an underrated actress.

Friel wonderfully conveys her sadistic character's tortured bond to her friend. She turns a scene where Marina tells Holly, "There's no me without you," into something poignant instead of overwrought. Her performance is powerful, emotional, and beautiful.

Kyle MacLachlan ("Sex and the City") makes an insinuating weasel as a professor who sparks romantic hopes in both young women. As Marina's cocktail- swilling mother, Trudie Styler (Sting's wife) cuts a glamorously wasted figure, the kind of woman who's great fun as your friend's mother and a nightmare as your own.

Much of "Me Without You" strikes a familiar chord and intelligently captures the difficulties that can disrupt even a close friendship. Goldbacher often spins her story against the backdrop of 1970s British pop records, including The Clash, Adam Ant and Depeche Mode. It's a wonderfully entertaining film that is true to life and gut-wrenchingly real. A wonderful little gem that deserves to be seen.

My New Favorite Romantic Movie
Worth it to witness the hard, ugly truth of friends who love each other and will spoil everything for one another to prove it. Also worth it for the well-crafted acting and very accessible script. However, for me, this tale of friendship became the mere backdrop for a surprisingly romantic story of longing and disappointment.

Michelle Williams does a remarkably subtle job throughout (I didn't expect this performance from her), and she is able to convey her character's infatuation for Marina's older brother with a truth never seen in the lovesick characters of Dawson's Creek. But the true revelation here is Oliver Milburn, who adds layer after layer to the cool but kind Nat. It is no wonder that Williams' Holly can't let go of her crush on this young man; in the skilled hands of Milburn, Nat becomes a "real boy" and is one of the most endearing "objects of affection" that I have seen in the movies in quite some time.

All performances are wonderful, with some small, very funny moments that can be easily missed if you aren't paying attention (I caught many on my second viewing).

Why not 5 stars? Well, I must confess that the ending left me wanting more. Also, don't expect extra's on this DVD. Except for the typical scene selections, subtitles (which was actually helpful - there is a lot of whispering in this movie) and 3 previews, there is nothing really added to this DVD.

One girl to another: We need to get divorced
This excellent film follows two girls who have been friends from childhood. They've lived next door to each other and are in and out of each others' houses daily. Holly is a sky, bookish, Jewish girl whose mother `comforts' her by saying "Some girls are pretty, and others are smart." Thanks, Mom. Marina, OTOH, is a knockout, has glamorous but unstable and unreliable parents, and a brother whom Holly secretly lusts after. As they grow, their friendship remains the one constant in their world - but one does wonder that it takes so long for Holly to realize that Marina is just using her and being very mean about it in the process.
Without either knowing (but of course all is eventually revealed), they have an affair with the same college professor, but throughout, there's this underlying attraction of Holly to Marina's brother, Nat, even after he's married a French actress.
Great flick with a touching ending. Terrific acting by everyone.