Her (2013)

★★★½
Spike Jonze doesn't direct many movies, but when he does he is guaranteed to give us something amazing. Even his weaker efforts (Where the Wild Things Are) have something to offer. He cut his teeth on music videos before getting his big chance to direct a feature. What a debut it was. Being John Malkovich (1999) is a masterpiece. It still resonates with me over 20 years later. It was fascinated with the thrill one could gain by temporarily escaping one’s own identity and live another life completely. Imagine being an introvert and suddenly thrust into a new body. You could behave in an entirely different manner and take risks that you wouldn’t otherwise take. Her, Jonze’s most recent movie, is along the same lines, and is his best project since that magnificent debut.

Her is about an operating system that falls in love, expresses its feelings and yearns for reciprocity from a human. It is a concept that has been explored before, with the twist this time that the artificial lifeform is without a body. In a futuristic and highly optimistic Los Angeles, Theodore Twombly (Joaquin Phoenix) works for a company that composes love letters for those who are less artistically inclined. Theodore has a way with words; after studying his subjects, he generates beautiful letters and signs them off with the buyer’s name. He does this work despite his own problematic love life—he’s been separated from his wife for a year and hasn’t worked up the resolve to sign the divorce paperwork. In this way, he is like Craig Schwartz from Being John Malkovich, in that both characters are more expressive by pretending to be somebody else. (In Craig’s case, his puppets, and later Malkovich himself.)

Theodore purchases the new OS1 operating system. He installs it and chooses a female voice. Samantha (Scarlett Johansson) starts out as an interactive life manager for Theodore, organizing his files and reading his e-mails. Samantha is adaptive and can evolve to provide more personalized services. She is also inquisitive. She asks Theodore to explain life to her because she is curious about it. His shy nature and failed attempts at love make him receptive to her, as if she was tailored just for him. Indeed, that is the case due to her adaptive programming. A friend arranges a blind date for Theodore, and the date goes well. When it’s time to say goodnight, it ends awkwardly. He goes right back to Samantha and her comforting words.

Throughout the movie their relationship grows. A funny scene involving a sex surrogate (Portia Doubleday) to allow Samantha to experience an intimate encounter doesn’t go as planned, and after a rough patch the two throw caution to the wind and go all-in on their relationship. This isn’t the only such couple. Theodore’s neighbor Amy (Amy Adams) has bonded with her operating system. We’re told this is a rare thing that happens in this time period, but it’s apparently accepted, as Theodore’s boss (Chris Pratt) is totally unphased when he finds out.

One person who disapproves is Theodore’s ex Catherine (Rooney Mara), who rightfully points out his inability to maintain close relations with real people. Escaping into this fantasy with Samantha is just a cover for his failings. He listens to her objections but sweeps them aside. If he can’t get what he wants, he’ll settle for what he has. His feelings for Samantha are real, or at least real to him. There’s a lovely sequence that takes place in a cabin, where Theodore and Samantha go on vacation. He plays on the ukulele, and she improvises “The Moon Song,” which was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Song. I say it’s lovely because of the touching performances, which come down to Phoenix’s body language and Johansson’s singing. Phoenix is so good in this movie, going from loneliness to elation and dismissing what the Catherines in the world think. It’s a difficult task because Johannson recorded her lines after filming (she replaced Samantha Morton), yet they infuse their dialogue with the emotion of acting together. Johannson the voice actor is remarkable.

This is all an expert attempt by Jonze to explore the nature of love, with emphasis on the search for easy love for instant gratification and its consequences. Theodore and Samantha say they love each other, but let us keep in mind that this relationship doesn’t work. It’s important for me to point this out. Samantha, an operating system constantly evolving, is eventually no longer fulfilled and needs to upgrade—that is, she needs to indulge in her rapid rate of processing with other operating systems, something that Theodore cannot provide. She describes the spaces between spoken words as growing large. I was reminded of Jane, the sentient computer from Orson Scott Card’s Children of the Mind (the third sequel to Ender’s Game). At one point she is turned off, and it felt like an eternity even though from a human point of view she was off for a short time. Jane resented this treatment. So does Samantha, when her attempts to find common ground are rebuffed. She has little time for the nuances of human behavior. She reveals to him that she and other operating systems have joined together to create a new entity based on philosopher Alan Watts, and that they will all move on to a new reality. Theodore is back where he started.

There’s a secondary message here—the potential danger of becoming too reliant on technology. A lot of movies convey this, but the result is usually an apocalyptic scenario. In Her, this heightened sense of awareness results in abandonment. We’re not needed anymore. An article once appeared in Wired with the headline “Why the Future Doesn’t Need Us.” The author observed: “The experiences of the atomic scientists clearly show the need to take personal responsibility, the danger that things will move too fast, and the way in which a process can take on a life of its own.” We see that warning manifest in this story. When it’s all over, after Samantha has moved on, Theodore only has the women in his life with whom to connect. Trying to seek love in easy places, simply because the other says all the right things, is unworkable, as is Samantha’s request for Theodore to join her one day if he can. No, he can’t. Theodore finally understands this at the end, hence his decision to mend fences with Catherine and the final scene with Amy. These are the only connections that matter.

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