Joined At The Hip

Married actors Dave Franco and Alison Brie play out the midlife couple fears of director Michael Shanks in Together

- TARA BENNETT

AS A JOURNEYMAN ARTIST IN Australia, Michael Shanks has made a living as a jack of all trades, able to compose, create visual effects, edit, write screenplays and direct short films. As unpredictable as his professional life has been, his personal life with his partner of 16 years, and within his long-term circle of friends, has been incredibly stable.

Shanks tells Red Alert that dichotomy got him thinking about what permanence does to some couples over time, and why they choose to stay together. "Seeing people who have been together for a long time, maybe they were together because they were used to each other more so than they were still in love," Shanks says. "To me, that was something really, really scary, the idea of being trapped with your other half just out of convenience. When you realise that you live in the same house, you breathe the same air, you eat the same food, you have the same friends and really are just sharing a life."

While happy in his own life, his screenwriting brain took those thoughts to the nth degree and turned it into his first feature film, Together. It looks at the long-term relationship of musician Tim (Dave Franco) and teacher Millie (Alison Brie). After a recent move to the country, they find themselves at odds with one another as they're forced to examine their life in this more isolated setting.