Vertical Entertainment
Ah, youth, how has thou forsaken thee? There’s a funny period in your 20s where you are in all meaningful ways an adult but still close enough to that ‘youth’ to be a bit complicated. Some people settle down and others go wild, and I’ve certainly met my share of both. But no matter how old you are, you’re never too young to feel dread about the future or that you’ve made the worst mistake of your life.
Mark, Mary & Some Other People comes from writer/director Hannah Marks, who although she is an actor, does not appear in this movie in any role. Instead she leaves it to the two romantic leads, Mary (Hayley Law) and Mark (Ben Rosenfield). Mary is more artistic and flighty, while Mark has a more 9 to 5 type of job — we meet them at first meeting and then falling in love, even if Mark is quite a bit more intense about it.
It’s all well and good until Mary’s friends Lana (Odessa A’Zion) and Tori (Sofia Bryant), both a lot of fun, point out that Mary is still young and yet she’s become that sort of boring cliché. If jokingly given, Mary still internalizes the potential pain points, and ponders her possible plans — naturally her actual place of discovery is a sort of idealized ‘modern young person’ concept: ‘Ethical non-monogamy’.
Which essentially means that they will hook up with other people while staying married and together for the important stuff. Just a way, in theory, to liven things up — but obviously such things are never quite so simple. Neither Mary nor Mark have any real trouble finding willing partners, nor do they ever seem to lose the spark toward each other — yet jealousy seems inevitable for them.
Mary wanted in on the idea to preserve her edge and youth, and Mark simply wanted to do what his wife asked — not that he isn’t enjoying aspects of the game as well. Director Hannah Marks handles all of these sex scenes quite well, tastefully done and often pretty funny. The two leads are also engaging and interesting, delving into the comedic, sexy, and sad places in equal measures.
A lot of characters come and go, and you may be surprised by the cameos that show up, but other than the two friends I mentioned, they really are the ‘Other People’ of the title. There’s a kind of rawness and honest emotionality to the complications of the relationship, even if sometimes it can be a bit contrived and ‘would this character really do this?’ sort of situations.
Ultimately though it was a pretty decent sort of rom-com of this indie variety, talking about this new fangled ‘non-monogamy’ in a way that while doesn’t fully explore the idea, gives it some interesting pathos and depth. I did like the acting of the two leads quite a bit, having not seen them in much else.
Hannah Marks is a fairly young person herself, and this movie has a pretty interesting self-assuredness to it in the script and the visual style (there are some great transitions and title cards used, with some fun editing). I suppose really I’m now mainly looking forward to see what she does next.
Want to see Mark, Mary & Some Other People and judge for yourself? Click below to see the movie, and be sure to come back and tell us what you thought!
Mark, Mary & Some Other People has a run time of 1 hour 30 minutes and is unrated.
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