Movie Review: "Her" (Spike Jonze, 2013)



MAN AND MACHINE: “HER” IS A TROUBLING TECH ROMANCE

by Bennett Campbell Ferguson

 

 

Left: Joaquin Phoenix stars in Mr. Jonze's movie

 

 

 

When we gaze into the future, what do we see?  That’s what some of the greatest filmmakers of our time have asked, and their answers have produced thought-provoking and adrenaline-charged movies like “Ender’s Game,” “Inception,” “Star Trek,” “WALL-E,” and “X2.”  But Spike Jonze’s “Her” is not like those films.  It is science fiction but not an adventure; futurist, but not fantastical; and finally, romantic, but not in the way that we usually envision romance.  It is, quite simply, the story of a man and his computer.

            That man is Theodore Twombly (Joaquin Phoenix), a lonely Los Angeleno living in a not too distant era where he writes for a nameless corporation and longs for happier days with his ex-wife, Catherine (Rooney Mara).  For some, this might an acceptable existence, but Theodore seems trapped in an aimless cycle of detachment amplified by endless moping and video gaming.  In fact, the only thing that brings him any sort of solace is his computer operating system, which calls itself “Samantha.”

            There are, of course, already technologies similar to Samantha (who is voiced by Scarlett Johansson), but none nearly as advanced.  Her capabilities seem limitless—not only does she whip Theodore’s life into shape by organizing his emails and compiling a book of his writing for publishing, but she reanimates him, restoring his joy in life itself.  Thus, our unlikely heroes set off into the city together, where Theodore shows Samantha (she “sees” via a smart phone-esque device) everything from pizza to an amusement park to a glorious beach that’s elegantly enlivened by Ren Klyce’s sound design.  It’s the kind of adventure that movies were made to depict—an emotionally regenerative journey that combines the grace of photography with the empathy of music and the tangibility of human expression. 

And yet, for all that, “Her” feels startlingly flat.  To begin with, its images look too much like fussily frozen pictures (when Theodore mournfully slouches in an elevator, he looks less like a man in pain and more like a model posing for a painting entitled “Misery”).  Even worse, Mr. Jonze’s screenplay is almost stunning in its programmatic literalness.  His movie may be about the human heart, but it has none of the spontaneity of that boundless organ; instead, it devolves into a series of conversations in which characters Explain How They Are Feeling and pontificate about the complications of love.  And while didactic dialogue is not inherently evil, it’s thoroughly unwelcome in the stately realm of Mr. Jonze’s film, which feels like a sluggish therapy session even without characters making grand pronouncements like, “We’re only on this Earth for a short while.”

            So how, you may wonder, could any filmgoer endure such insufferableness?  The answer is by being patient.  Because even when “Her” is at its most static, you can enjoy K.K. Barrett’s masterly production design (with its red plastic chairs and light colors, this new Los Angeles looks a postmodern daycare center—a chilling and picturesque suggestion of what America’s coming years may hold) and once Theodor’s love for Samantha turns to troubled disaffection, things start to get interesting again.

            It all begins when Theodore meets Catherine for the final signing of their divorce papers, during which he makes the mistake of telling her about Samantha.  The problem is that by this point in the movie, Theodore no longer sees Samantha as a mere robotic assistant—he’s fallen in love with her chirpy kindness (don’t blame him; Ms. Johansson fills the character irresistibly tender sincerity) and he has no scruples about referring to her as his girlfriend.  To many people, this seems completely unordinary (in Mr. Jonze’s future, dating a computer has become a social norm), but Catherine is appalled.  For her, Theodore’s affection for a robotic device is not a strange quirk, but a proof of his inability to relate to living, breathing people.

Catherine may be right, although “Her” achieves a powerful ambiguity that makes it both a critique of and a love letter to technology.  In fact, what Mr. Jonze seems to be suggesting is that no one could not love Samantha—that her ability to be charming, understanding, and still a unique contribution to Theodore’s life makes her a wondrous and valuable individual.  Yet he also allows us to see the troubling claustrophobia that arises as Samantha and Theodore grow closer, as well as the childlike dependence their relationship engenders.  So while Theodore may gradually grow apart from his electronic paramour, that doesn’t stop him from running frantically into the street and sprawling across the sidewalk when she mysteriously disappears.

            That panicked scene is perhaps the finest moment in “Her,” mainly because it rents the movie’s reflective atmosphere and gives it a jittery emotional charge of desperation and fear.  I only wish that there were more moments like that in Mr. Jonze’s movie and fewer dully neat images, like the recurring close-ups of Theodore’s face as he lies in bed, unable to sleep. 

But really, could the dull nature of “Her” have been part of its director’s grand plan?  After all, it is such a stiffly staged film that it leaves you where it should—wanting to walk out of the theater to rejoin the real world.