The trailer proudly announces that "You and I" was directed by "two-time academy award nominee Roland Joffe." Indeed, as unbelievable as this may sound, Roland Joffe used to be a great director back in the 1980s, whose credits include the masterful Killing Fields. Sadly, "You and I" represents a long litany of bad films showing that Joffe has truly lost his way. The set up is intriguing. Two wild young women, Lana (Mischa Barton) and Janie (Shantel VanSanten), embark upon an endless night on the town amidst Moscow's high society and underground criminal world. They take a devil may care attitude to their colourful surroundings and, as one may expect, Janie in particular gets mixed up with the wrong kind of people and becomes thoroughly immersed in the dangerous world of illicit substances. Only love - in this case a lesbian relationship - can save Lana and Janie from their own self-destructive urges.
Unfortunately, the lesbian relationship is not believable despite being the centerpiece for the whole film. If Mischa Barton and Shantel VanSanten's characters do not share any sexual or romantic chemistry on screen, then the audience has no reason to care about their relationship. The lesbian sex scene is the perfect metaphor for everything that is wrong with the movie. It happens underneath the covers with the result that we see no passion, no love, and not even any humanity -- elements which are all important to sex. When the two women are not beneath the covers, their chemistry is just as invisible. There are many reasons for this deficit which can be reduced to screenplay problems and poor acting. The screenplay is not written well enough to challenge the actors to elevate their performances or provide the audience with unique insights into lesbianism (for which Patricia Rozema and Jamie Babbit have set a high standard). But compounding this failure are the poor performances. Mischa Barton seems so focussed on mastering the Russian accent and language that she fails to create a unique character to hold our interest. Shantel VanSanten keeps her American accent, but also fails to do anything fresh with her own character. Moreover, Mischa Barton and Shantel VanSanten are also not very interesting when they are together. As a result, the film fails not because certain plot points may be considered silly or implausible (and "You and I" has plenty of those) but because the love story is so contrived and lacking in emotion that it does not compensate for the weaknesses in the plot.
The only entertaining things about "You and I" are some nice shots of Moscow and the TATU girls, Lena Katina and Yulia Volkova, who are genuinely charming and charismatic. But they only have a cameo performance and for the rest of the film we are stuck with a lesbian relationship that lacks any human emotion and a plot that is even worse.
Unfortunately, the lesbian relationship is not believable despite being the centerpiece for the whole film. If Mischa Barton and Shantel VanSanten's characters do not share any sexual or romantic chemistry on screen, then the audience has no reason to care about their relationship. The lesbian sex scene is the perfect metaphor for everything that is wrong with the movie. It happens underneath the covers with the result that we see no passion, no love, and not even any humanity -- elements which are all important to sex. When the two women are not beneath the covers, their chemistry is just as invisible. There are many reasons for this deficit which can be reduced to screenplay problems and poor acting. The screenplay is not written well enough to challenge the actors to elevate their performances or provide the audience with unique insights into lesbianism (for which Patricia Rozema and Jamie Babbit have set a high standard). But compounding this failure are the poor performances. Mischa Barton seems so focussed on mastering the Russian accent and language that she fails to create a unique character to hold our interest. Shantel VanSanten keeps her American accent, but also fails to do anything fresh with her own character. Moreover, Mischa Barton and Shantel VanSanten are also not very interesting when they are together. As a result, the film fails not because certain plot points may be considered silly or implausible (and "You and I" has plenty of those) but because the love story is so contrived and lacking in emotion that it does not compensate for the weaknesses in the plot.
The only entertaining things about "You and I" are some nice shots of Moscow and the TATU girls, Lena Katina and Yulia Volkova, who are genuinely charming and charismatic. But they only have a cameo performance and for the rest of the film we are stuck with a lesbian relationship that lacks any human emotion and a plot that is even worse.