Spike Jonze is the visionary director of music videos and commercials, some of his famous music videos are the ones he did for Fat Boy Slim such as Weapon of Choice and Praise You, the Beastie Boys' Sabotage and Oh So Quiet by Bjork to mention a few. The man is talented, not just a marketing gimmick.
Over the years he has made the crossover to feature film with the quirky, cool films that are not necessarily conventional in their story telling but always have a real heart in them; from
Being John Malkovilch to
Adaptation to
Where the Wild Things Are.
Now he brings his sensibilities to the sub-genre of man loves machine trope (read
this if you want anecdotes of other films that deal with similar subject) to bring us his first movie which he both directs and writes: Her.
To movie boffins Her can be seen as the perfect companion piece to
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. A film about love, relationships and acceptance in a world where technology has turned us more and more into recluse cocoons, whereby even human interaction and sex is mediated through megabytes.
If you don’t know the story of Her ... it's basically about a dude (Theodore - played by the great Joaquin Phoenix) who falls for his computers Operating System (Samantha) - yes, a computer program, which has been given high artificial intelligence and the sexy voice of Scarlett Johansson.
Yeah it’s like all you iPhone folks falling for a higher version of Siri just because she can organize your life better, is programmed to meet your needs and has that sexy Scarlett voice … Moving right along, although the movie is definitely in Sci-fi territory, Jonze and cast play it as an indie human-drama piece.
There are no large spaceships, no lasers, yes the fashion and technology on display kinda points to the future but there’s no grand spectacle and look-at-me-how-futuristic-I-am shots. Everything is simple, sleek and unobtrusive like the story, I think that Steve Jobs of Apple would approve.
This calm simplicity also applies to the performances. Joaquin Phoenix channels a nerdy-like-Ryan Gosling of
Lars and the Real Girl feel. There are no screening chewing performances like he did in Gladiator but like this movie, his performance is very subtle and subdued.
Amy Adams also makes a wonderful turn in the movie. Rooney Mara is quickly turning into the angry white girl and I can’t remember the last time Olivia Wilde looked so pretty in a movie. Scarlett's voice talents are brilliant. Let's say the performances have everything for everyone.
Kudos has to be given to Spike Jonze though, he and his team create a future world of soft speak. A world that has its own fashion but somehow speaks more to our world now. Although this future world is close to perfect, human interaction is still flawed.
Jonze examines the problem with humans and their relationships through Theodore and Samantha’s relationship. You get the good, the bad and the darn ugly about human relationships. If technology is a reflection of us, its creators and users, the film really says a lot about how we use it to separate us from the world while still trying to interact with it.
Sometimes it seems relationships are the same thing: a game of separation and interaction. One day we might just have cybersex with our PC’s, who knows? Who would have thought that we would have text, phone and even cybersex? So much of our world is about being online, being jacked in but like Theodore we are still cut off from real human interaction and it’s even worse in the big cities, even though everyone is a click or message or call away.
Do yourself a favour and go watch this classic of our time. Her is currently playing at Cinema Nouveau.
The trailer:
Rating : *****
*junk **almost bearable ***now we cooking ****almost perfect *****classic
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Trailer Watch
Game of Thrones Season 4Oh yeah. Khaleesi and company are back with more naked bodies, dragons, recasts, sword fighting and yes drama. If you haven’t seen the first trailer and second trailer for season 4 where the hell have you been?
Readers of the book will notice from the trailers that elements from beyond A Storm of Swords and A Feast for Crows feature in the 4th Season - even stuff from Book Five A Dance with Dragons is hinted at.
This is very smart by the show's producers, it means we are not going to slow down when more new characters are introduced but the core story of the characters we've been following will still lead.
The other cool thing ... it looks like we won't have to wait for Episode 9 to see some shocking twists and turn. The trailer hints at a lot of things happening and more action at the Wall and finally the introduction of the Kingdom of Dorne into the mix. Season 4 is going to be a killer hehehehe.
iNumber Number You watched SABC 1’s
Class Act and you loved
Tempy Pushas and
isiBaya ... well, get ready to see your leading man in an action flick. Sdumo Mtshali plays the lead in iNumber Number coming out in April in SA but if you are in Jozi you can check it out over the weekend during the Jozi Film Festival at Maboneng and participating cinemas.
Trailer looks action-packed and Donovan Marsh never disappoints as a director. By the way ... the film's rights have already been bought by Hollywood who is now making their own version of iNumber Number…it might be that good.