Sunday, January 12, 2014

"Her" a Film with Joaquin Phoenix


An unusual set of random circumstances: completely drained me of energy on Saturday; then was re-energized by the SF 49ers on Sunday morning’s win, and then with an early game end, I took an early nap, leaving me with an unfilled 7-9pm timeslot, which was when “Her” was playing at the Airport Stadium 12.

What a fascinating movie.  I was interested in what was going to be happening soon in the computer relationships world.  Joaquin Phoenix is the main character, and he is almost Chaplinesque in playing the meek, downtrodden soul that finds no successes in his life, especially with women.  Amy Adams is his ex-wife [a successful author], Rooney Mara is his best friend [a computer games authoress], Olivia Wilde is a hot-babe his friends try to set him up with, and Scarlett Johansson as the voice of Samantha, his computer friend.

This is not a Sci-Fi theme, no more so than “You’ve Got Mail” with Meg Ryan was 15 years ago.  It’s a girl meets boy tale [loses; then finds], but I won’t give away who.  He has imperfect relationships with all four co-lead women.  He comes to understand each relationship as the 2-hour movie unfolds.  There is no “film time” to develop other male characters.  The two they couldn’t write out of the script were clearly MCPs.

I enjoy the author William Gibson’s take on futuristic ideas, usually ten years out.  This film is just a clean and neat short story that could be this year or next, but it also could be a Gibson short story.

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