Did something organic get lost in the process, somehow heightening the air of detachment? Perhaps that's the intention after all, a wry satire about falling in love with your mobile phone shouldn't be expected to ooze human warmth. It was only during the lengthy editing process that Jonze recast the object of Theodore's affection, with Scarlett Johansson stepping in as the voice of Samantha. But, as Theodore grows in confidence, so too does the self-named Samantha, the infinite portals of the virtual world enabling her to become so much more than the sum of his parts.Īt its inception, Her partnered Phoenix with mercurial talent Samantha Morton who was on set every day, playing an off-screen Annie Hall to his Alvy Singer. One minute Theodore is having functional conversations with his OS about cleaning up his inbox the next he's having the kind of cybersex that has proved the preferred method of interaction for isolated online lovers the world over. Faux intimacy is Theodore's stock in trade, yet he falls for the seductive skills of an electronic office organiser that reads him like a book – and offers unquestioning allegiance in the wake of his failed marriage to independently minded Catherine (Rooney Mara). Within this evolving electronic ecosystem, the premise of Spike Jonze's self-penned modern romance seems like business as usual, as Joaquin Phoenix's soon-to-be divorcee finds unexpected happiness with an operating system (OS) tailor-made to put him at his ease. Phoenix plays Theodore Twombly, a twitchy, tortured soul hiding behind tortoiseshell spectacles who holds down a day job ghostwriting personalised (e-)letters for those unable to put their emotions into words. Meanwhile, over in the real world, plenty of people have engaged in flirty interactions with everything from their satnav (popular voice options include a Frenchman who tells you that you look fabulous as you take the next left) to their Siri (as per The Big Bang Theory), with both marriages and divorces resulting from the intimate interactions and infidelities of online avatars.
HER SPIKE JONZE MOVIE
And in Andrew Niccol's S1m0ne, a film director creates a supposedly compliant virtual movie star with whom the whole world promptly becomes infatuated, forcing him into a lifelong relationship that begets digital children. Harrison Ford's Deckard didn't seem to know whether he was human or robotic as he fell in love with a replicant in Ridley Scott's Blade Runner. In the Frankenstein-inspired 80s teen comedy Weird Science, two teenagers brought dream girl Kelly LeBrock to life by wiring a Barbie doll to a computer, while Electric Dreams placed an operating system named Edgar in the middle of a love triangle with a musical twist. This film certainly raises that idea, but I think it handles the topic with a lot more ambiguity.A s far as sci-fi cinema is concerned, there's nothing unusual about falling in love with a computer or conjuring your perfect partner from a keyboard. The message of Dont Date Robots is a pretty well-explored topic in sci-fi and is always fascinating to me.
It's something very real and very relatable. If there's a message (and I think there's many messages you can take from the story) is that sometimes people who are in love grow apart, and it's not anybody's fault. It's a fascinating story to watch unfold. The film shows us the progression of Theo and Samantha's relationship from beginning to end. Her world has become way bigger than him. They still love each other, but Samantha has grown so far and so fast that she's outgrown Theo. The same happened with Theo and Samantha in the end. But by that point in the film we've become more accepting of their love.Ĭatherine and Theo were in love but they then grew apart, as did Amy and Charles. But his true friends in the film, Amy and Paul (Chris Pratt's character), were totally supportive and not weirded out by him "dating" an AI.Ĭatherine reacts to the news that he's dating an AI the same way I did earlier, with revulsion and disgust. My reaction when he first called her his girlfriend was to cringe, as I'm sure it was for most of the audience. That certainly is a huge theme of the film. I don't necessarily think its about nothing being able to replace human connection. There's so much to unpack and it has so many layers. I just finished watching it for the first time.
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