Movie Review: Comet

"Why does it feel so impossible to let you go?" -Dill 

Set in a parallel universe, Comet bounces back and forth over the course of an unlikely but perfectly paired couple's six-year relationship.

Although the movie is confusing, it does seem to open the eyes to most viewers. Comet tells the story of six years of a relationship between Dell (Long) and Kimberly (Rossum) in intercut scenes of its biggest moments—meet-cute, break-up, get-back-together, break-up, etc. The narrative jumps from scene to scene out of chronological order.

Dell seems to be the most pessimistic man to ever live. For example, his “I hate people who think I’m too negative" statement is not the most optimistic thing to say. He is the kind of relative misanthrope who lives in the “five-minutes-from-now” due to constant worry. Kimberly lives in the now. Dell falls for her the minute he sees her, in one of those Comet Streaks Across the Sky moments that most of us believe only happens in movies and the cynical can’t forgive when it does. He falls so hard, that he asks for her number in front of her truly annoying boyfriend, a gent who talks about how The Beatles were better when Pete Best grounded them and the beauty of soccer. Dell doesn’t want to miss the “now,” as he has so often in his life.

The movie starts to drift into the mystical, even forcing us to wonder if these images are visions of the future, the past, or some dream state, Esmail loses his hold on the material ever so slightly. And one wishes he had opened up the film a bit more in terms of film structure, as it often feels like it might work better as a two-actor piece on a stage the way it exists now. He also over-uses his score a bit too much, using it often to link the different scenes in a way to keep a cinematic throughline, but it gets a little forceful.

In the end, Dell and Kim end up together? I would think so because of the split second right before the screen goes black and the credits begin to roll.