Olivia Cooke is one of the brightest young stars in the business, lighting up the screen as the calculating Alicent Hightower on HBO’s House of the Dragon and balancing big-budget projects like Ready Player One with smaller indie fare like the Oscar-nominated Sound of Metal. Now, she’s returning to the world of television in Prime Video’s psychological thriller series The Girlfriend, for what looks to be her most complex role yet.
But before all those high-profile credits, Cooke broke out in a big way as Rachel Kushner, a high school student fighting cancer, in the 2015 indie dramedy Me and Earl and the Dying Girl. Based on the novel by Jesse Andrews (who also wrote the screenplay), the movie was a big hit at the Sundance Film Festival, snatched up by Fox Searchlight in a hefty bidding war. It went on to receive warm reviews and a decent box office for an indie film, though it also has its detractors and is rarely discussed today.
‘Me and Earl and the Dying Girl’s Teen Tearjerker
Me and Earl and the Dying Girl also stars Thomas Mann as Greg Gaines, a high school senior who doesn’t have too many friends beyond his close relationship with the titular Earl (RJ Cyler). The two don’t have much ambition beyond goofing off and making spoofs of classic movies, encouraged by their unconventional history teacher, Mr. McCarthy (Jon Bernthal).
Greg learns that his childhood friend Rachel (Cooke) has been diagnosed with leukemia, and he’s compelled by his loving parents (Nick Offerman and Connie Britton) to try and befriend her again. After some initial awkwardness, the two start to hit it off, and Greg brings her into his and Earl’s world. As Rachel’s condition worsens, Greg begins to neglect his studies to help her, putting his future college plans in jeopardy, as well as his friendship with Earl.
Me and Earl and the Dying Girl was one of many indie movies from around that time to mix humor and tragedy, covering the whole thing in a thick veneer of self-aware mid-2010s quirk. Movies like 2014’s The Fault in Our Stars, This is Where I Leave You, and 2013’s The Spectacular Now all trod similar ground, spurred on by the indie film boom that had begun about a decade earlier with movies like Napoleon Dynamite and Garden State. This style of film, which tended to perform very well at Sundance, has largely fallen out of favor and can’t help but feel somewhat dated from a modern perspective.
While it was largely well-received at the time, it emerged at a moment when American indie cinema was shifting away from these kinds of hipster-courting dramedies, making it more a victim of poor timing than poor quality. It has the cancer plot of The Fault in Our Stars mixed with the snarky, unreliable teen narrator of Juno, which may have been a combination that was too much for some people. The film is certainly a product of its time, but divorced from some of the expectations surrounding its release, it remains a worthy and often quite moving experience.
Why ‘Me and Earl and the Dying Girl’ Deserves To Be Remembered
One of the chief complaints about Me and Earl and the Dying Girl comes from something baked into the DNA of the book and the movie: that the story is told largely from Greg’s perspective. To some, this made the character of Rachel little more than a device for Greg’s personal growth, rather than a flesh-and-blood character with her own wants, needs, and desires. This is a valid criticism, but, as David Ehrlich argued in a 2015 essay for The Dissolve, there’s also a valid argument that this was intentional, to illustrate how little anyone can truly make sense of death from their own point of view.
It’s understandable if that doesn’t assuage the movie’s detractors, but beyond that, there’s a lot to like about it. While her character might not get as much agency as Greg, Cooke does excellent work as Rachel, facing down her own mortality with a mix of fear and clarity that cuts right through Greg’s self-mythologizing. Mann is also quite good as Greg, unafraid to make him selfish or self-loathing when necessary. Cyler’s Earl is a bit more of a cypher, but his falling out and eventual reconciliation with Greg is an important reminder that, for as much as they have in common, there are parts of each other they can’t really understand.
The supporting cast all get moments to shine, especially Bernthal’s small role as one of the “cool teachers,” Offerman and Britton’s loving, often exasperated parents, and a tremendously moving turn from SNL vet Molly Shannon as Rachel’s mother. The performances do a lot of work to anchor the story in an understandable emotional reality that balances the film’s conspicuous style. The big climactic moment, where Greg and Earl screen the movie they made for Rachel in her hospital room shortly before her death, set to the chugging synths of Brian Eno’s “The Big Ship,” is undeniably powerful.
Ultimately, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl was just one step in Cooke’s, Mann’s, and Cyler’s growing careers, all of which have flourished in the years since. But it’s a worthy film in its own right, one that deserves to be remembered today. At the very least, it makes for a fun time capsule to a very different moment in movie history. You can buy or rent Me and Earl and the Dying Girl on Prime Video or Apple TV.
