Woody Allen without the zingers: Materialists reviewed

Spectator

2 days ago

Celine Song's first film, the wonderful Past Lives (2023), earned two Oscar nominations. So expectations were riding high for Materialists. Perhaps way too high. And, yes, it's a letdown. It feels like an early Woody Allen but blunter, shallower, with no zingers, and a lead character that's hard to care about. Dakota Johnson is our lead, playing a matchmaker who has two dreamboats (Chris Evans, Pedro Pascal) vying for her hand and throughout I was thinking: I should have your problems, love.
It's billed as a romcom but those who expect that will be disappointed. It's more an essay on modern dating. Johnson, whom we have forgiven for her horrible performance in that horrible adaptation of Persuasion – we don't hold grudges – is Lucy. She works for a swanky Manhattan dating agency called Adore (ugh) that deals exclusively with the rich elite. She sees marriage as a business transaction in which people are buyers or sellers. The montage of clients' demands and feedback from first dates – too fat, too short, too old, too balding, 'I would never swipe right on that' etc. – is fun but only one client gets any real attention. This is Sophie, a 39-year-old lawyer who fears dying alone. She is played by Zoë Winters who steals the film from under everybody despite it being a minor role.
Lucy attends the wedding of one of her clients and here she meets Harry (Pascal, gliding into view in a way that put me in mind of Omar Sharif). He's a 'unicorn' – hot, rich, tall, full head of hair – but, what do you know? At the same event, serving as a 'cater waiter', is John (Chris Evans). He's her ex, an out of work actor who – a flashback informs us – she left because they were always broke. He still wants her but Harry also now wants her. I wondered why, as she comes across as neither interesting nor especially bright. Midway through there's an act of violence and she is forced to reflect on the nature of her work and you think, you've never reflected on that before? Wake up and smell the coffee, lady!
As an exploration of the tension between love and money the film is surprisingly unsubtle from the word go. The opening scene involves a prehistoric cave couple – I thought I was in the wrong screen! – which even sets out the film's stall when it comes to marriage, albeit in a laughably clumsy way. Lucy, meanwhile, has the following dilemma on her hands. Should she be seduced by Harry's $12 million penthouse or return to broke John? (Harry! He has silk sheets!) This leads her to question whether we might be worth more than our 'tangible assets' but is that taking us anywhere new? What is new, I suppose, is how far people will go to 'add value' to themselves these days but that involves a surgical subplot that I can't go into as it would take us into spoiler territory.
The characters feel like cinema characters rather than character characters. They have no friends, no family, no interests beyond the dating scene. The film is talky, with some sharp dialogue, but no fresh insights. A good actor has something going on behind the eyes that the audience wants to know about and I'm not sure I ever get that with Johnson. Evans and Pascal bring A-list pizazz but no chemistry is ever ignited. I only ever felt for Sophie whom the film abandons just as she's always been abandoned. Poor Sophie. And why does Lucy have to choose? Why not neither? Is this saying marriage is the pinnacle of a woman's achievement?
It's lushly photographed and beautifully framed and it's not a nightmare to sit through but whereas Past Lives stayed with you, I can feel this leaving me already.