Miranda July is the weakest part of her own movie.

The movie, and the plot–the big ideas about our sad attachment to the internet, about getting older, about the weird pressure of normal life creeping in (babies, commitment, money, belief) as you age, the reality of romantic love sustained over time–all those things are done with wonderful subtlety. But in the movie, July, playing the antagonist is too precious, too quirky, too Miranda July awkward in the extreme that it draws her out and apart from the rest of the people in the movie, sets her in a strange relief against the other people who are acting normal. Like, their acting is normal. Not stilted. Their plots are fringed with magic and coincidence and it makes sense. It is hard to tell is she is outpaced by the other actors, or if she can only really do Miranda July, or if being the antagonist is too much kabuki for her. She was the part that kept me from immersing in the film. The guy that plays her boyfriend, and his part, are quiet perfect–her writing for him and his performance of a dude accidentally waking up to his life, and to the world around him and it’s possibilities–is really the highlight. The only parts of July’s performance I found to fit with the rest of the film is the revelation of how insecure she is, in her pursuing an affair with the divorcee dad. Flitting in discomfort and disconnect, just to be pursued and belong somewhere. While a lot of the reviews pose this relationship’s awakening between July and her boyfriend around the adoption of the cat-narrator (alternately cloying and effective), it really only comes unglued once they shut off the internet. That’s what exposes them as rudderless, envious, mistaken and their connection to each other as tenuous at best.

I can’t say I wouldn’t recommend it. There is merit in watching it. If you can handle July acting like she’s lost inside a Portlandia skit, you can hang with this movie.