Can love really be conceived by a partner simply checking off all of the boxes of their significant other? Well, it’s Lucy’s (Dakota Johnson) job to try. As a matchmaker now in her second career, she’s pretty damn successful at it, successfully aligning taking singles’ must haves and ultimately playing point guard. She’s been the reason that nine new weddings have happened. At the reception of her latest love story creation, she meets the brother of the groom, Harry (Pedro Pascal). A conversation quickly reveals that Harry is single and a unicorn — tall, rich, smart, and no red flags. In other words, he’s in demand for the types of things Lucy’s clients seek. Harry has little interest in having someone find love for him, he sees potential in Lucy and the two slowly become intertwined with each other.

All this happens as Lucy’s past boyfriend, John (Chris Evans) reenters her life at the same wedding. John, a struggling actor, once dated Lucy for five years, and the issues in financial stability caused them to split and color what she’s seeking out of a mate. While no longer together, feelings exist on both ends for the past lovers. As her situation with Harry evolves and so does her job itself, Lucy is forced to confront what love looks like and resembles to her.

It’s almost always impossible for a director who creates a truly special movie in their debut to be able to top it in their follow-up effort. And for Celine Song in Materialists, her sophomore outing does will not top the excellence most found in Past Lives. But that does not make Materialists a poor movie. Even with some odd story detail choices, the overall swing taken at dating and love in the modern century lands pretty memorably.

Materialists shines most in its production. Song’s direction in the film is elite, often covering up for shortcomings in her script. She’s created the type of feature where the characters could be delivering Seinfeld-like nothings, and yet it doesn’t matter because of the immaculate blocking, usage of light, camera movement, and proximity. Her Past Lives cinematographer Shabier Kirchner helps a lot with the technical aspects, and the versatile composer Daniel Pemberton’s score adds a fittingly cold yet emotionally longing undercurrent to the on-screen narrative.

The many aspects of love are in every nook and cranny of Materialists. Song’s script (while subtly comedic in parts but less of a comedy than one might anticipate), is intensely interested in posing questions like whether love should be effortless or worth some effort, and if someone making you feel valuable is the same thing as feeling valued by that person. These questions set against the unique world of matchmaking also turn into a commentary on analytics versus gut feel. Two-thirds of Song’s script really works well—especially as each part of the love triangle has its own visual storytelling for those paying attention to the details. But the last third dips in quality due to predictability, an inability for Song to sell us on the finalized relationship, and some message clashes that are hard to overlook.

Johnson is quite the polarizing figure these days when it comes to thespians. Her work has been described at times as detached and flat, and in certain roles the criticism is warranted. But in other roles, her aloofness pairs well with the characters she’s playing, and in Materialists that applies as we begin with her machine-like view on love and see her slowly transform into something more organic. Much has already been made of the lack of chemistry she has on screen with Pascal, but this is clearly intentional. Together, they share the most impactful and philosophical scenes in the feature. In an unfathomable way, Evans’ performance is the most dynamic while simultaneously being the least interesting of the trio, as his character seems mostly to further the story and Lucy’s journey by proxy. He and Johnson lack the spark that the movie needs to drive home its point about romance.

Not one of the more emotionally rich romance films, Materialists did leave me wanting more. And yet, it is still a film that manages to make a thoughtful impression, and one I’m still thinking about despite the first draft feel areas of the script carry.

B-

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