In 2023, Past Lives was an inexplicable minor phenomenon, a thoroughly mediocre Sundance hit that nevertheless stuck around in theaters over the summer and “genuinely touched” a lot of people. Inoffensive and weightless, Past Lives felt as if it were made for streaming, and the not inconsiderable praise it garnered was baffling. Writer/director Celine Song is back two years later with Materialists, ostensibly an about face into straightforward romantic comedy (as if Past Lives wasn’t “straightforward”—in other words, conventional). Before I saw it, there was an ominous tweet from Eddie Averill of the Extended Clip podcast: “You know that shitty rom-com they see in Burn After Reading, where the guy goes, ‘Would you get down from there?’ Materialists is that fake movie if it had zero jokes. Baffling.”
There are plenty of film people on Twitter who’ve been baffled by Materialists since the (excellent) trailer came out a month or so ago; Averill also cites the trailer as evocative of the kind of serious, accessible, and mature movies that feel like a dying breed. The trailer’s the best of the year so far, and it so outpaces the movie that I’m sure it’ll be the only thing related to Materialists that I remember in a year. Unlike a lot of film people on Twitter, I love romantic comedies, and I was happy to hear that Song wasn’t going to repeat herself. Despite a, once again, baffling opening scene where “cave people” flirt and make flower rings for each other, the movie jumps to modern-day Manhattan and keeps its plates spinning for at least 45 minutes.
Dakota Johnson stars as Lucy, a high-end matchmaker with a remarkably morbid outlook: she regularly talks of dying, dying alone, nursing homes, “grave buddies.” Johnson’s flat affect goes a long way towards selling an “expert in love” who compares her job to a mortician; throw in a tumultuous childhood with lots of fighting and no money, and you have a romcom protagonist… I guess. Unfortunately, there’s more to it than mix and stir. Song has zero wit, and even worse, she writes like a therapy chatbot, more interested in getting her “points” across than communicating through her characters, her story, her mis-en-scène. The film is handsomely lensed by Shabier Kirchner, who really knows how to light her subjects—but the best looking romantic comedy of the year is still Jane Austen Wrecked My Life.
Lucy meets Harry (Pedro Pascal) and runs into her ex John (Chris Evans) the same night. Who wins? Lucy wants someone filthy rich, and Harry’s $12 million Tribeca penthouse says it all, but he’s not in love with her, nor her with him; they’re a “perfect match,” but that’s all statistics. He also had his legs broken in a dozen places to make him six inches taller. “I wouldn’t have had the confidence to hit on you if I were this tall,” Pascal says as he half-crouches to meet Johnson’s face. “I promise you,” she says, “you would’ve.” She ends up with John, a waiter in his 30s with roommates; just as everything’s settled, she’s offered to lead the Manhattan office of Adore Matchmaking. She waffles on the phone, but she’ll probably take it; the movie ends with Lucy and John in the park, and the credits roll over yet another wedding reception.
And there’s another “cave people” scene… which Johnson narrates… and unfortunately, her voice over close-ups of flowers and scenic landscapes just immediately evokes Madame Web and studying spiders in the rainforest before her mother died or whatever. This isn’t Johnson’s fault—all of the awkwardness in Materialists comes straight out of Song, who’s either too afraid of offending anyone or possibly looking silly, or who isn’t very talented or interesting in the first place, as a writer or a director. Johnson, Pascal, and Evans are all good actors, capable at their worst, and Song just leaves them hanging in so many places here. The dialogue sounds like a chatbot wrote it; characters stand with their arms at their sides in flat two shots, waiting for their turn to talk. In a way, Materialists is a “traditional” romantic comedy in its refusal to step outside its own bounds, self-created or not. It does reflect the antiseptic, semi-cyborg effect of the 2020s, but with some light at the end of the tunnel: the fact that this movie got made by A24 and a rising indie auteur at all tells me that there will be more American romantic comedies soon.
But that’s all there is to hope for here. What little comedy the movie has is dispensed quickly, and its charm does last for nearly an hour before the wheels start spinning. There are side plots that do nothing but weigh down what should be a fluffy movie—and “fluffy” isn’t a bad thing. How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days is fluffy and moving, a masterpiece, one that’s comfortable pitting men against women and understands how to play the sexes off of each other. Dating, love, and marriage have been compared to war in movies for decades, but Materialists presupposes that men and women are terrified of each other, forget about understanding. The movie really gets sidetracked when one of Lucy’s clients (Zoë Winters) is assaulted on a date that Lucy set up; why this is the turning point for an otherwise cold, calculating and intelligent woman is a mystery, and Lucy’s reaction is totally at odds with her character up to that point. Maybe Song felt her movie needed that “weight,” but it just comes off half-baked and, at worst, cynical—see, I’m not just making a stupid romcom!
Well, I like stupid romcoms. Of course they can be serious and tragic, too—look at Terms of Endearment, which Song cited on the “syllabus” for Materialists. James L. Brooks’ 1983 directorial debut is a masterpiece in tone, performance, and pacing, with a remarkably fine touch when it comes to creating real, full human beings. People forget how nasty Debra Winger and Shirley MacLaine are in that movie, or William Hurt, Albert Brooks, and Holly Hunter in Broadcast News, or, most of all, Jack Nicholson in As Good as it Gets. These are examples of romantic and comedic excellence in the American cinema, indeed, as good as it gets. Song doesn’t clear that bar; she doesn’t even make it past Failure to Launch. Like Past Lives, Materialists is an unremarkable dud.
—Follow Nicky Otis Smith on Twitter: @MonicaQuibbits