Everything Everywhere All At Once is a movie that resonates with me more than any other I’ve ever seen. My parents divorced when I was 9, for a long time I was furious at my mom for causing it. She didn’t but I didn’t know that then. For a long time, around 15 years, there was a palpable air of tension between us.

We would sometimes get into shouting matches but it was mostly just a cold war, neither of us willing to cave and talk about what was going on. That, along with Evelyn taking care of her elderly father, is what I relate with the most with Joys and Evelyn’s relationship.

I also deeply empathize with Joy feeling like she’s disappointed her mom by not living up to her expectations. When I was in my mid-20's my parents told me over and over that getting a college education would greatly improve my station in life. So, I tried. Over and over I tried to get through various community college programs, but it just wasn’t for me. I felt like I let my parents down, like I failed them. Just as Joy feels like she’s the worst possible version of herself.

She says to Evelyn, “Why not go somewhere where your daughter is more than this?” She feels like any version, even one with hot dog fingers, is still a better version than the one where they started in. But then, Evelyn says in return, in one of the most heart wrenching sentences ever put to screen: “Of all the places I could be, I just want to be here with you.” Crushing.

In that moment, she’s telling Joy, and the viewer, that even the worst version of ourselves, or the version we perceive as being the worst, is still very much worthy of unconditional love.