'Materialists' review: Dakota Johnson, Pedro Pascal and Chris Evans isn't the glossy rom-com many expected
Calling Celine Song's Materialists a rom-com is oversimplifying what we're really getting from the film. Starring Dakota Johnson, Pedro Pascal and Chris Evans, the movie takes the fantasy and tropes about love and relationships that we've grown accustomed to in classic rom-com films, and presents them in the real world context we sometimes like to avoid.
It's the way that Song is able to tell a story that evaluates human behaviour in an honest way that makes her work stand out, and compels you to go on the journey she's presenting. And that's very much the case with Materialists.
Materialists release date: June 13Director & writer: Celine SongCast: Dakota Johnson, Pedro Pascal, Chris EvansRuntime: 116
In Materialists Johnson plays a matchmaker in New York City. While she's certainly living beyond her means with her $80,000 salary, her job is to match the city's elite. But no matter your income bracket, the desperation to find a partner is alive and well. And Lucy understands how human beings evaluate and value each other.
When Lucy attends a wedding of two of her clients she meets Harry (Pascal) who's classified as a "unicorn," a particularly "high value" bachelor. He's rich, handsome and desirably tall. But just as the two meet, in comes John (Evans), Lucy's ex who's working as a waiter at the wedding.
John is the opposite of Harry. He's broke, living with roommates, struggling in his efforts to be a theatre actor. He's everything Lucy knows she doesn't want as she math-ing her best partner, but their magnetic connection is undeniable.
Through both Lucy's own love life and matchmaking for her clients, Song's story dives into the commodification of ourselves, and others, that guides our connections.
If you're someone who was blown away by Song's previous film Past Lives, Materialists is adding to the discussion about relationship, but in a different way.
We've all watched rom-coms and fell for the fantasy of meeting the perfect person who will sweep us off our feet, but what Materialists does is shine a light on how many of those depictions of love and romance have twisted how we approach finding love. Amplified by things like dating apps, social media and other ways to commodify human beings.
A simpler version of this story would have been cynical about how love is hard, heartbreak hurts and romance ends in disappointment, but Song's movie is more complex than that. A testament to her storytelling, she's able to weave back and forth just over that line of reimagining rom-com tropes in a real world context, but never completely disregarding how impactful romance is.
The cast certainly works for these character, but because they're so beloved by many and have a rich history with fans, their presence essentially disarms you, in a way that helps to take in and feel the impact of Song's evaluation of how people objectify each other.
At one point in the movie Song introduces Lucy finding out about sexual assault between her clients. While a very real risk, narratively it leaves questions about how it's handled as a plot device, and how Johnson's character would be impacted by that result to her matchmaking work.
While not the glossy package that was sold in the movie's trailer, and particular scenes are more impactful than the full picture of Materialists, it's certainly an intriguing film that presents romance in a way you likely won't be expecting.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Geek Tyrant
an hour ago
- Geek Tyrant
Dakota Johnson Says Hollywood Is a "Mes" and "Decisions Are Made by People Who Don't Watch Movies" — GeekTyrant
Dakota Johnson isn't holding back when it comes to how she sees the current state of Hollywood, and honestly, she's saying what a lot of creatives and movie fans, like myself, have been thinking. While promoting her upcoming film Materialists on the latest episode of Hot Ones, Johnson was asked by host Sean Evans why Hollywood has become so risk-averse. Her response was candid and damning: 'I think it's hard when creative decisions are made by committee and it's hard when creative decisions are made by people who don't even really watch movies or know anything about them, and that tends to be what's occurring a lot.' She didn't stop there. Johnson went on to call out the industry's endless loop of remakes and reboots: 'When something does well, studios want to keep that going so they remake the same things, but humans don't want that. They want fresh, they want to feel new things, experience new things, see new things, so I don't know, I guess it's all just a bit of a mess right now, isn't it?' Johnson's frustrations aren't new, especially in the wake of Madame Web , which underperformed spectacularly, grossing just $43 million domestically and sitting at a painful 11% on Rotten Tomatoes. Johnson has made it clear that while she tried to bring something to the role, the end result wasn't exactly in her hands. 'It wasn't my fault. There's this thing that happens now where a lot of creative decisions are made by committee. Or made by people who don't have a creative bone in their body. And it's really hard to make art that way. Or to make something entertaining that way.' And while some actors might try to smooth things over or dodge blame, Johnson isn't playing that game. 'I think unfortunately with Madame Web, it started out as something and turned into something else. And I was just sort of along for the ride at that point. But that happens. Bigger budget movies fail all the time.' It's not the first time she's been vocal about the disconnect between Hollywood executives and actual storytelling. Johnson previously made it clear that she believes the industry is relying too heavily on algorithms and formulas rather than trusting artists and respecting audiences: 'You cannot make art based on numbers and algorithms. My feeling has been for a long time that audiences are extremely smart, and executives have started to believe that they're not. Audiences will always be able to sniff out bullshit.' Johnson's comments echo a broader frustration across the industry. As studios cling to IPs and safe bets, many creatives are pushing back, demanding something different. Something original. Something human.
Los Angeles Times
an hour ago
- Los Angeles Times
A new look at ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest' plus the week's best movies in L.A.
Hello! I'm Mark Olsen. Welcome to another edition of your regular field guide to a world of Only Good Movies. Among this week's new releases is 'Materialists,' a romantic dramedy starring Dakota Johnson, Chris Evans and Pedro Pascal, written and directed by Celine Song, whose debut, 'Past Lives,' was nominated for two Oscars, including best picture. Johnson's beguiling screen presence, her languidly charged charisma, is put to full use as a professional matchmaker in NYC who finds her own cold calculations challenged when she finds herself struggling to decide between a wealthy, perfect-on-paper finance guy (Pascal) and a perpetually struggling actor ex-boyfriend (Evans). I interviewed Song and Johnson together recently, talking to them about how the film is both a sleek and glossy modern take on the rom-com and also an interrogation of the form and what people want from romance. 'We're not just showing up here to be in love and beautiful and get to be in a rom-com,' says Song. 'We're also going to take this opportunity to talk about something. Because that's the power of the genre. Our favorite rom-coms are the ones where we get to start a conversation about something.' For her part, Johnson has turned down many rom-com roles in the past, but found something different in Song's screenplay. 'The complexities of all of the characters,' Johnson said of what made the project stand out. 'The paradox. Everyone being confused about what the f— they're supposed to do with their hearts. And what's the right move? I found that very honest and I found it just so relatable.' Amy Nicholson opens her review by focusing on the film's lead, writing, 'Dakota Johnson is my favorite seductress, a femme fatale of a flavor that didn't exist until she invented it. … Onscreen, she excels at playing skeptics who are privately amused by the shenanigans of attaching yourself to another person. She shrugs to conquer. Which makes Johnson the perfect avatar for a time when it's hard to commit or keep swiping right.' On Friday the Academy Museum will present the North American premiere of a new 4K restoration of Milos Forman's 1975 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.' The film won five Oscars, including best picture, director and actor, and the screening will include a conversation with editors Richard Chew and Lynzee Klingman, speaking with Larry Karaszewski. Based on the novel by Ken Kesey, the film tells the story of Randle McMurphy (Nicholson), who is committed to a mental institution instead of serving a prison sentence. McMurphy's rebellious, anti-authoritarian spirit upends the strict order of the facility maintained by Nurse Ratched (Louise Fletcher, who also won an Oscar for her performance), as he comes to connect with some of the other inmates, many of whom are there voluntarily. The Times' original review at the time said that the film 'is calculated to restore your faith in the discipline and the emotional effectiveness of inspired fine moviemaking.' A February 1976 profile of Forman by Fiona Lewis found the filmmaker, already a two-time Academy Award nominee for his films made in Czechoslovakia, in a rented house in the Hollywood Hills anxiously awaiting the impending Oscar nominations. 'All these events, like film festivals and Oscars — it's foolish to compare if this film is better than that film,' Forman said. 'But on the other hand, why not? It's like my child is the most beautiful in the world and the girl I love the best.' The Acropolis Cinema screening series begins a retrospective of the Italian-born, U.S.-based filmmaker Roberto Minervini Friday night with the Los Angeles premiere of his 2024 film 'The Damned' at 2220 Arts + Archives. The filmmaker will be there for a Q&A moderated by 'Eephus' director Carson Lund. Minervini won the directing prize in the Un Certain Regard section of the 2024 Cannes Film Festival for the movie, which follows a company of volunteer U.S. soldiers in the Civil War as they are sent to patrol a remote borderland. 'The Damned' will also open at the Laemmle Royal on the June 20. Minervini will be present for a screening at Brain Dead Studios on Saturday for the world premiere of a new restoration of his 2011 debut feature 'The Passage.' Critic Peter Debruge will moderate the Q&A. Then on Sunday, Minervini will be present for a Q&A moderated by critic Tim Grierson following a 10th anniversary screening of 'The Other Side' at 2220 Arts + Archive. On June 23, there will also be a screening of Minervini's 2018 film 'What You Gonna Do When the World's On Fire?' back at Brain Dead Studios. 'Bring It On' 25th anniversary in 35mm Following the recent screening of Sofia Coppola's 'The Virgin Suicides,' the Academy Museum will present another pivotal film in the career of Kirsten Dunst: a 25th anniversary 35mm screening of Peyton Reed's 'Bring It On.' Actors Jesse Bradford and Brandi Williams will be present for the event as well. Displaying Dunst's range, she stars as Torrance Shipman, the new captain of the cheerleading squad at her affluent suburban California high school. Torrance discovers that their championship routines have been stolen from the squad of a less privileged all-Black school. Reed, who went on to direct 'Down With Love,' 'The Break-Up' and Marvel's 'Ant-Man' movies, deftly balances teen comedy, emotional nuance and social satire with a spirited energy. After calling it 'a smart and sassy high school movie that's fun for all ages' in his original review, Kevin Thomas noted how the film 'has a light satirical touch, works up lots of laughter, but is not heavy-handed about Torrance and her squad taking cheerleading so seriously. Rather than lament how winning a cheerleading trophy seems vastly more important to the squad members than getting the grades that will get them into college, [screenwriter Jessica] Bendinger and Reed instead show us the likable Torrance and her pals receiving some unexpected life lessons.' 'Christiane F.' 4K restoration On Friday, the American Cinematheque will launch a limited run of the new 4K restoration of Uli Edel's 1981 'Christiane F.' Based on a nonfiction book, the story depicts a teenage girl, Christiane (Natja Brunkhorst), in West Berlin who falls in with a crowd of kids who introduce her to using hard drugs and she soon becomes a heroin addict, living a hardscrabble life on the streets. Featuring music by David Bowie, the film also includes a live performance by Bowie of the song 'Station to Station.' In a February 1982 review, Kevin Thomas wrote, 'The makers of 'Christiane F.' apparently feel that it is sufficient to dramatize this hellish odyssey with the utmost realism, sparing us nothing, not the sickness, the brutality, the pain or the sheer sleaziness of their existence. But it isn't, because they don't reveal anything that many adults and teens don't know well. … [The filmmakers] go for an unremitting grittiness so as not to seem unduly sensational or exploitative in the telling of Christiane's story.' 'Cobra Woman' in 35mm On Saturday afternoon at the Los Feliz 3, the American Cinematheque will present a 35mm screening of Robert Siodmak's 1944 beloved cult object 'Cobra Woman,' starring Maria Montez, Jon Hall and Sabu in a tale of twin sisters, kidnapping and a remote island paradise. Author Alonso Duralde will be on hand to introduce the film and do a signing for his new book 'Hollywood Pride: A Celebration of LGBTQ+ Representation and Perseverance in Film.' In a program note for the screening, Duralde noted Susan Sontag's influential essay 'Notes on Camp,' adding 'for a look at 'pure camp,' there's no better place to start than the 1944 Maria Montez vehicle 'Cobra Woman,' a deliciously over-the-top exercise in exotica, colonial fetishization and general absurdity. (The trailer calls it 'A Pagan Sensation!') Montez stars as twin princesses — one good, one evil, both in love with strapping Jon Hall — in a tale that incorporates volcanoes, blowguns, Sabu, a forbidden dance of the snakes and a valuable stone that Montez memorably calls the 'Cobra jool.'' The film was also said to be the favorite of filmmaker Kenneth Anger. A February 1944 Los Angeles Times column by Hedda Hopper explored how Montez pursued stardom with shrewdly calculated verve, writing, 'Outstanding among today's feminine stars who have projected their personalities — and persons — to fullest advantage is Maria Montez. Two years ago this Latin-American bundle of nerve and determination struck Hollywood like a one-woman avalanche, announcing to Universal that she would be satisfied with nothing short of top-flight stardom and swamping the studio's production office with demands for starring roles.' 'Naked Lunch' with Peter Weller On Monday, Vidiots will show David Cronenberg's 1991 adaptation of William S. Burroughs' 'Naked Lunch' in 4K with star Peter Weller in attendance to sign his new book 'Leon Battista Alberti in Exile.' Rather than strictly adapt the book itself, Cronenberg used fragments and shards of its story and Burroughs' own biography to craft a phantasmagorical take on the novel's own creation: An exterminator, Bill Lee (Weller), flees New York for the Interzone after he accidentally shoots his wife (Judy Davis) and sets himself to writing. In a review from December 1991, Peter Rainer wrote, 'There are enough references to the novel, enough episodes and characters, to provide a glancing resemblance to the original. But mostly, Cronenberg jacks up his own career-long obsessions with glop and grunge and decay to fever pitch. It's a movie for people who really dig Cronenberg's mulchy fixations — and probably for no one else. … The ambi-sexual atmosphere carries a demonic charge that approximates Burroughs but, for the most part, Cronenberg was a lot closer to the Burroughs ethos in a film like 'Videodrome' than he is here.' In a June 1992 profile of Cronenberg by Gene Seymour, the filmmaker, then 47, spoke about how he approached adapting a book many assumed to be unadaptable. 'I do think it's paradoxical but true that, in order to be faithful to the book, you have to throw the book away,' said Cronenberg. 'You have to betray it in order to re-create it for the screen. All the attempts I've seen of trying to be literally faithful to the book have been dismal failures and the reason is only that the two media are totally, totally different. Maybe it's because I'm really ruthless. And totally arrogant.' In a statement, Burroughs himself said, 'I felt, and still feel, that David's script is very true to his own Muse as a filmmaker, very consistent with the high level of artistry for which he is known.'
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Materialists Is a Romantic Comedy That Takes Romance Seriously
Dakota Johnson as matchmaker Lucy in Materialists Credit - Courtesy of A24 The decline of the romantic comedy began around the era when people began referring to these movies as 'rom coms,' a term drawn from the hokey industry slang used in olden times by trade publications. Romantic comedies have always existed almost solely for pleasure's sake—that's what's great about them. But they don't deserve the degrading slangy shorthand they've been slapped with, which feels like marketing terminology that we've openly welcomed into our everyday language. Movies are commodities, sure. But also: the romantic comedy might be the most sublime entertainment genre devised by humankind. Why do we insist on sanding down its dignity to a manageable niblet? In the public spheres where people argue about such things—namely, social media—people who have seen Celine Song's mournful-delightful Materialists are eager to warn people that despite how the trailer makes the movie look, it's not a romantic comedy. But maybe it is a romantic comedy—it's just not a rom-com, the kind of Kate Hudson–Matthew McConaughey laugher-weeper-laugher where the heroine falls off a boat, or breaks the heel of her shoe, or goes through a whole box of tissues to dry her tears after the wrong-guy-whom-she-thinks-is-right dumps her. It's more subtle than that, spikier, and certainly a lot less hilariously funny. But whether intentionally or not, Song, who wrote and directed the film, seems to be applying the principles of the finest romantic comedies, like those made by Ernst Lubitsch or Preston Sturges. Materialists is more bittersweet than sweet—which is what makes it so wonderful, in a wistful, elusive way. Read more: Celine Song's Journey From Matchmaking to Materialists Dakota Johnson plays Lucy, an ambitious New York matchmaker who listens carefully to what her clients want in a partner and then locates a corresponding human who possesses as many of those qualities as possible. She promises one prospective male client that she can help him meet 'high quality women.' Almost all the guys who come to her want a woman who's fit, though their definition of that is alarmingly restrictive. Nearly all the women want a guy 6 feet or taller; they also, unsurprisingly, want a guy who makes money. Lucy is happy to go shopping for them, and she's honest—maye a bit too honest—about the transactional nature of finding a mate. 'Marriage is a business deal, and it always has been,' she tells a panicky client, a bride-to-be already dressed in her finery, who has gotten cold feet. These people, the women especially, have been more forthright with her about their hopes and desires than they have been with their therapists. One client in particular, Sophie (Zoe Winters), is simply a nice person who's been rejected by too many of the men Lucy has set her up with. Lucy urges her to stick with the program—she'll find Sophie a guy. Meanwhile, we know very little about what Lucy herself wants. After she persuades that reluctant bride to walk down the aisle, she tries to relax and enjoy the wedding. The groom's best man—lo and behold, it's Pedro Pascal in a tuxedo, playing a self-made millionaire named Harry—strikes up a conversation with her. She sees dollar signs when she looks into his eyes, but not for herself. She thinks he'd make an ace partner for any of her most demanding clients. He's rich, gorgeous, well-mannered—she calls him a 'unicorn.' But he's interested only in her. Before she can even think to flirt with him, her ex shows up at her table with her go-to beverage order, a beer and a Coke. That ex is Chris Evans in regulation black-pants-and-white-shirt catering gear, playing a character named John; he plunks the drinks in front of her like a challenge. She's surprised to see him—but despite itself, her face lights up like a carnival Ferris wheel. They agree to meet after the wedding, where they have a serious discussion in his beater of a car—who keeps a car in New York? she still wants to know—about why they broke up in the first place. As they talk, the traffic around them magically hushes, and Johnny Thunders' "You Can't Put Your Arm Around a Memory" wafts from the car stereo. By definition, the past is a thing you can't hang onto, but these two insist on trying. Then Harry begins seriously wooing Lucy, who wants many of the same things her clients do, though she's reluctant to admit it. He takes her to dinner at nice places, instead of just sauntering back from the halal truck with a crinkly bag of rice-and-stuff. Meanwhile, John, chronically underemployed as an actor, keeps resurfacing. What does Lucy really want? She doesn't even dare ask that question. But Harry's apartment—one of those anonymous high-rise spaces that people with taste supposedly want, even though they practically scream 'no taste'—sure is nice. And John still lives in some deeply unfashionable far-flung New York neighborhood, with roommates. There's no contest between these guys. Read more: Never Underestimate the Power of Dakota Johnson Except there is. Materialists isn't laugh-out-loud funny. Even so, some of Lucy's pronouncements are so truly awful that a blunt snort of laughter is the only response. Song wrote plays for years before making her debut film, 2023's Past Lives, a gorgeous, tender picture about a Korean-Canadian immigrant in New York (played, marvelously, by Greta Lee) who's shaken when her childhood crush reemerges in her life. Materialists is markedly different in mood and tone. But like Past Lives, it's all about the things we don't dare to want. How do we ever know we're making the right choice? Song seems to want to reassure us that we don't. Certainty is a game for fools. Song was inspired to write Materialists after working herself, for a time, as a matchmaker. If you have to categorize it, Materialists is closer to what Stanley Cavell called the comedy of remarriage, movies in which people who are already married separate, ostensibly on their way to divorce, and flirt with other partners before returning to the person who is, for them, home. But unlike Materialists, those movies—pictures like Leo McCarey's The Awful Truth or Preston Sturges' The Palm Beach Story—emerged in a time when Hollywood censors were keeping a close eye on movies' ideology, determined to protect audiences from unwholesome influences. The comedy of remarriage created a safe place for fantasy out-of-wedlock flirtations, because, in the end, the genre reaffirmed that sticking with the partner you originally chose is your best bet after all. Materialists riffs on the same idea, but for other reasons. The comedy of remarriage rose in popularity at a time when people—especially women—suddenly had more autonomy, relatively speaking, and didn't necessarily have to succumb to arranged marriages, or marry as a way of uniting family fortunes. With Materialists, Song shows us how far, and yet not-so-far, we've come. Women aren't just encouraged to work, we're expected to—yet our salaries are statistically still far lower than those of men. We may pretend not to want or really need all that much money, but even a cursory peek at Instagram reveals ostensibly ordinary women doing their daily stuff, only they're wearing the $600 sweatpants outfit, not the Old Navy one, and burbling about how they just bought their first Birkin (new). What's up with that? Often, sure, those women have made that money themselves. People inherit money, too. But when there's a male partner in the picture, it's normal to be curious about who has the real earning power. We shouldn't care, but how could a young woman on her own, struggling just to make rent, not wonder? That's the world Materialists takes place in, and Song sees what's funny and what's terrible about it at once—even as she acknowledges that it's human to yearn for beautiful things, and for comfort. She's chosen the perfect actors for this enterprise. Evans breathes both charm and originality into the character of the classic New York actor-cater-waiter. We may think of them as stereotypical, but they're more just a fact of life. They're a real thing, and they're everywhere—Evans shrugs right into this character as if it were the rumpled shirt he threw on the floor last night. Pascal, as the tall, rich guy who keeps saying he just wants love, is adorable with just a hint of danger. On one of their early dates, at a sleek, obviously expensive restaurant, Harry brings Lucy a whole pot of flowers; it's overkill, but he just can't see it. He's that kind of guy. Pascal captures his winsomeness, even as he forces you to ponder whether you'd really want to deal with that level of anxious-to-please attentiveness your whole life. Wouldn't it become exhausting? But Johnson is Song's real not-so-secret weapon here. She's a rarity among modern performers: there's no desperation in her, no overt eagerness for likes. She's both breezy and matter-of-fact. Lucy has come to loathe her job, but she's good at it; she loves the guy with no dough, but she can't help aspiring to the comfy brownstone life—who wants to live in a place with a cruddy kitchen, a leaky roof, and an unresponsive-landlord? Song, along with the character she and Johnson have shaped together, understands the weight of those questions, and she refuses to dismiss them outright. In that sense, Materialists is as far from rom-com territory as you can get. But in its understated, clear-eyed intelligence, it's like Myrna Loy—the co-star, with William Powell, of the Thin Man comedies, among the most elegant and observant movies about marriage ever made—in movie form. This is a movie about question marks, not sure bets. And what is long-term, committed partnership but an ever-unfolding series of question marks, to which the answer is a sometimes-grudging, sometimes whole-hearted Yes? Materialists takes the risks seriously, without ever underselling the rewards. Contact us at letters@
