2013’s Her, written
and directed by Spike Jonze.
Starring Joaquin Phoenix, Scarlett Johansson, Chriss Pratt,
Rooney Mara, Amy Adams, Matt Letscher, Kristen Wiig, Olivia Wilde, Lynn
Adrianna, Lisa Renee Pitts, Gabe Gomez, and Brian Cox.
Winner of an Academy Award for Best Original
Screenplay (Spike Jonze).
Nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture, Best Production Design (K.K. Barrett and Gene Serdena), Best Song (Karen O), and Best Score (William Butler and Owen Pallett).
Nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture, Best Production Design (K.K. Barrett and Gene Serdena), Best Song (Karen O), and Best Score (William Butler and Owen Pallett).
What is it about?
Set in the near future in Los Angeles, lonely divorcee Theodore
(Joaquin Phoenix) decides to purchase an Operating System (OS) that has
features of Artificial Intelligence. The A.I. goes by Samantha (Scarlett
Johansson), and the two of them hit it off. Theo continues his life of working
as a ghost letter writer, spending time with his best friend, Amy (Amy Adams),
and getting to know Samantha- until things grow complicated.
Why is it worth seeing?
Her is the rarest
of creatures, a relationship movie that is able to penetrate the nitty gritty
and messiness of human relationships- without making us dread them. It features
a future in which despite gobs of technology existing (and the endless
possibilities in which to get lost in it), real connection is possible. The
result is, well, connective.
Centred square in the middle of the story is Joaquin Phoenix’s Theodore. He plays a man, lonely, pretty much broken- but not because of his living in a Blade Runner dystopian future. Instead, his cautious disposition is self imposed, furthered along by shrinking into technology. His past relationships, told in occasional stunning flashbacks, have left a hole in him that he desperately wants to fill. You can see that in his reaching out to his best friend, or while on a blind date- that sense of child-like joy and synergy that one feels with life’s surprises and shared bio chemistry. So when he learns of an operating system that features Artificial Intelligence, he tries it out, and he is as overwhelmed by the prospects of what is possible, as we are. Phoenix’ reactions as he gets to know a self aware consciousness is spell binding, because in his evolution, we get to experience that universal thrill of falling for somebody, at marveling at other people’s quirks, those tics and features that make us experience the joy of love. But it’s more than just glorified meet cute guppy squishiness- what makes the performance so holistic is his frustrations, his inability to always communicate his desires, to be whom he wants to be.
Almost as prominent, if only by utterance, is Scarlett Johansson’s performance as a sentient artificial intelligence. Few can play as glossy and abstract as well as Johansson (Under the Skin, Lucy, Ghost in the Machine), so in some ways this performance, as a sole disembodied consciousness, is her spirit animal of sorts. It’s entrancing, the sort of thing that telephone customer service managers working at swindling data companies could only dream of. Sounding the way she does, it feels like there isn’t anything she couldn’t convince you to do, with a timbre that can flex as easily from inquisitive to sexy to confident to furious- all in a nano second. For something so unattached to an actual body, it weighs more than most people.
But that’s the thing about Jonze’ screenplay. It makes all the characters so real, even the ones that aren’t… real. Jonze would go on to win an Oscar for best original screenplay, and still doesn’t get enough credit for the seamlessness with which we see the infinitesimal results of all the characters’ relationships bouncing off one another. But then, perhaps it’s no surprise that the guy who made the phenomenal Where the Wild Things Are, perhaps the best movie about the trauma of emerging boyhood adolescence ever penned, could create a world full of characters who are so full in their dysfunctional growth and healthy desires regarding relationships. After all the drama and algorithms have played themselves out, we’re reminded of the evolution of healthy beings.
Jonze never uses the plot of a human dating a computer as a crutch, an opportunity to highlight the comedic possibilities or infinitesimal outcomes of relationship chess.
Instead, he treats the possibilities that the situation would present as any other choice autonomous creatures would choose- making a movie set in the near future timeless. Same goes for the movie’s sense of optimism. Spurred along by the decision to show as little blues as possible, there is a refreshing amount of optimism in the stirring art design of the film- and the film’s final shot. It really says something about the uniqueness, and quality of the film, that it could be done as well in any genre, setting, or circumstance- but usually won’t, because few are as assured and confident in their distinctive sense of person, or in their intimacy. It really gets that- and it’ll get you.
Centred square in the middle of the story is Joaquin Phoenix’s Theodore. He plays a man, lonely, pretty much broken- but not because of his living in a Blade Runner dystopian future. Instead, his cautious disposition is self imposed, furthered along by shrinking into technology. His past relationships, told in occasional stunning flashbacks, have left a hole in him that he desperately wants to fill. You can see that in his reaching out to his best friend, or while on a blind date- that sense of child-like joy and synergy that one feels with life’s surprises and shared bio chemistry. So when he learns of an operating system that features Artificial Intelligence, he tries it out, and he is as overwhelmed by the prospects of what is possible, as we are. Phoenix’ reactions as he gets to know a self aware consciousness is spell binding, because in his evolution, we get to experience that universal thrill of falling for somebody, at marveling at other people’s quirks, those tics and features that make us experience the joy of love. But it’s more than just glorified meet cute guppy squishiness- what makes the performance so holistic is his frustrations, his inability to always communicate his desires, to be whom he wants to be.
Almost as prominent, if only by utterance, is Scarlett Johansson’s performance as a sentient artificial intelligence. Few can play as glossy and abstract as well as Johansson (Under the Skin, Lucy, Ghost in the Machine), so in some ways this performance, as a sole disembodied consciousness, is her spirit animal of sorts. It’s entrancing, the sort of thing that telephone customer service managers working at swindling data companies could only dream of. Sounding the way she does, it feels like there isn’t anything she couldn’t convince you to do, with a timbre that can flex as easily from inquisitive to sexy to confident to furious- all in a nano second. For something so unattached to an actual body, it weighs more than most people.
But that’s the thing about Jonze’ screenplay. It makes all the characters so real, even the ones that aren’t… real. Jonze would go on to win an Oscar for best original screenplay, and still doesn’t get enough credit for the seamlessness with which we see the infinitesimal results of all the characters’ relationships bouncing off one another. But then, perhaps it’s no surprise that the guy who made the phenomenal Where the Wild Things Are, perhaps the best movie about the trauma of emerging boyhood adolescence ever penned, could create a world full of characters who are so full in their dysfunctional growth and healthy desires regarding relationships. After all the drama and algorithms have played themselves out, we’re reminded of the evolution of healthy beings.
Jonze never uses the plot of a human dating a computer as a crutch, an opportunity to highlight the comedic possibilities or infinitesimal outcomes of relationship chess.
Instead, he treats the possibilities that the situation would present as any other choice autonomous creatures would choose- making a movie set in the near future timeless. Same goes for the movie’s sense of optimism. Spurred along by the decision to show as little blues as possible, there is a refreshing amount of optimism in the stirring art design of the film- and the film’s final shot. It really says something about the uniqueness, and quality of the film, that it could be done as well in any genre, setting, or circumstance- but usually won’t, because few are as assured and confident in their distinctive sense of person, or in their intimacy. It really gets that- and it’ll get you.
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