REVIEW: ‘This, That, And Everything In Between’ Weaponizes Emotions Excellently

This, That, and Everything in Between (Ganito, Ganyan, Ganoon), directed by Cholo Laurel and written by Cody Abad, Shania Sumergido, and Cholo Laurel, introduces film writer Joanne (Jodie Sta. Maria) as her career is about to take off. But before she can realize her dream, her mother, Paz (Agot Isidro), crashes into her life after 27 years to upend everything around her. 

What do we owe our families? Should they always have a spot at our tables or in our hearts, or are we in the right to cast out someone who hurts or neglects us and does nothing to fix the harm they have caused? This is a question that each person ultimately makes for themselves at some point in their life. Whichever option is taken, it causes pain as the ramifications play out. This pain is something that This, That, and Everything in Between explores beautifully. 

Paz’s relationships with everyone else in this movie are strained at best and outright toxic at worst. Just breezing back after nearly three decades away, she acts like she never left and no one has any right to be angry with her. In virtually every way, she is selfish, insisting on being the center of attention. And the most important element of her character comes through powerfully because of how hard she commits to her egotistical nature.

This, That, and Everything in Between does a good job making Paz a whole person.

While it is easy to write Paz off as a heinous individual, This, That, and Everything in Between does a good job of presenting situations where she’s not. Sometimes she seems to be hurting or scared. As her motivations for coming home are revealed, some of her less tactful interactions begin to make more sense. But not all. Her egotism and cruelty come far too casually to be something born of immediate circumstances. 

This conflict highlights a painful truth about choosing to be selfish or hurtful all the time: people can’t tell when your actions are driven by other motivations. If a generally nice person says something mean in a moment of fear or shame, most will forgive them. They’ll understand. But when you are always crappy to people, suddenly having an excuse doesn’t go as far for you. 

While most of her family and friends are largely willing to bend over backward to make their prodigal family member feel welcome, Joanne is less willing. As the daughter who was abandoned with no reason or contact thereafter, she is less inclined to accept her mother’s cruelty.  As those around her praise Joanne for her achievements, her mother can only chime in, commenting on the obvious source of her daughter’s gifts. Not applaud her, just try to claim her success as her own. 

Agot Isidro weaponizes every hostile emotion to excellent effect.

As someone who, at an early age, decided family would get no breaks from me, I felt confident that I would not like how this movie would end. That Joanne would ultimately accept her mother simply because, and the duo would have a good cry, and decades of neglect would be forgotten for the sake of a clean ending. However, This, That, and Everything In Between chooses to take a different route. And while I think its ultimate destination is fantastic, it may leave many feeling the narrative lies unresolved. But I think that may be the point.

The reality of lifelong connections that are unhealthy and painful is that they rarely get wrapped up in a tidy bow. That’s why so many of us need therapy after all. Even if both Joanne and Paz wholeheartedly wanted to resolve their differences and make amends, it would be unlikely to happen so cleanly. Rather than bringing its emotional narrative to a conclusion, it settles for an emotional understanding. By the end, Joanne understands her mother better, even if things are not where many would want them to be when the credits roll. 

While there are several strong performances here, Isidro’s Paz steals the show. Every hostile emotion the character wields, like a veritable weapon against those who often try to help her, comes out in an excess of spite and cruelty. She spares no one. But while these bombastic moments of hurt stand out the loudest, Isidro’s performance also conveys the woman’s pain without ever letting it fully into the light. She cannot fully expose her hurt, so she hurts others to distract from it. 

The movie always does well creating the right mood with its lighting and setting.

This, That, and Everything in Between paces itself well as it moves through its nearly two-hour runtime. Each emotional moment is given time to breathe, and choices made are allowed to impact the story meaningfully before the plot shifts to the next issue at hand.

It also does a good job of creating the appropriate mood for each scene. Light is always complementary to each scene, and the environment is often introduced at the perfect moment to punctuate a particular exchange. While tricks like a crack of thunder coming in right after a heated declaration aren’t new, it still helps put that exclamation point on the moment. As if nature itself is affected by the emotions of those arguing. 

Some may say that This, That, and Everything in Between fails to fully resolve its narrative. But as you come out on the other side of Joanne’s skilfully implemented emotional journey of confrontation and pain, one can’t help but feel like trying to wrap up her pain in a neat bow would be inconsiderate to her pain. And she’s had to deal with more than enough inconsideration by the time the credits roll. 

This, That, and Everything in Between is now streaming exclusively on Netflix.