So Jake Gyllenhaal is never coming back from this right?

All Too Well was a song that came out during my teenage years and has a very special place in my heart, so having the 10 minute version be released and having all these memories and feelings come flooding back, I can tell you that my teenage self inside is very happy.

All Too Well the short film follows Taylor Swift and Jake Gyllenhaal as they go through their love affair when she was barely out of teenage years. You see the highs and lows of their relationship and it’s all shot as if you are there watching it as a fly on the wall observer which really gives the whole thing a very intimate feel.

I really enjoyed the casting of the two main parts of this short film. The fact that Dylan O’Brien has a beard and looks much older than the female counterpart, Sadie Sink, who is known for playing a young teenager in Stranger Things really cements that feeling of disconnect between the two. How Taylor clearly wants this love to work but it never occurred to her, because their ages are too different and clearly he saw her as too young for him, that it never would.

This short film includes a lot of Easter eggs to other Taylor Swift songs and moments in the video mirror moments in other music videos she has also done. Despite this, even if you’re not a hard-core Taylor Swift fan, you can still really enjoy this music video for what it is because it really gives you that sense of unrequited love and young love and wanting things to work out when it’s clearly not destined to be. You really get that sense of sadness watching these two lovers knowing what’s going to happen in the end but still wishing throughout that it doesn’t.

I thoroughly enjoyed this. When I was doing my A-levels I had to create music videos and All Too Well was a song that I would create storyboards to and watching this was how my teenage self saw it being, which made me really happy. It’s a gorgeous, sad, beautiful, tragic story and it’s so lovely to have your thoughts and feelings put into a song by another person that understands what you went through and that makes you feel less alone.

What did you think of the short film?

Until next time.

Published by shonaharding

Media graduate with a passion for reviewing film and TV. View all posts by shonaharding