Jeff's Reviews

Thoughts on every movie I've ever seen.

Her (2013)

Directed by Spike Jonze

Starring Joaquin Phoenix, Lynn Adrianna, Lisa Renee Pitts, Gabe Gomez

Author

A engaging, haunting look at the future of socialization and romance, and a touching story about one man’s connection with technology. Is this what’s really going to happen?

Jonze put this movie together beautifully. Some great shots, wonderful colors and architecture, a nice score, and carefully edited. I love Jonze’s choice to bring back 70’s fashion. Perhaps it was just his hipster impulse, but like many things, fashion is cyclical, and I bet some of those clothes and mustaches do come back in a generation or two.

Phoenix’s best performance by far. Charming and likeable and believable, he nails the “aw shucks” thing and every emotional note. Johansson’s raspy voiceover works well, especially considering it was entirely rerecorded.

A couple of story points. If the technology to make lifelike and humanistic artificial intelligence is available, wouldn’t a lifelike physical body for it be a piece of cake? I mean, in the present day, aren’t we far more advanced with bodies of robots than artificial intelligence?

And I also question the business plan of a company that has created a product that has the capacity to breaks people’s hearts. Would such a product be successful? I’d imagine a lot of customer complaints.

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