HER

FLIX!

During the Christmas Holiday, my daughters were home from college. As young people do, they had to be on their phones nearly all the time. The older daughter cannot sit through a meal in a restaurant without going to her phone every 4 minutes. That's a lot, but when I say nearly all the time, my younger, Samantha, has to have hers in her hand every moment of everyday. If she lays it down it will be right in front of her. I timed her while they were home and the longest Sami ever went without referring to her phone was seven and a half minutes. In fact once in the car she dropped it down between the seats in my car, and went into total and complete junkie panic until I could stop the car and she could retrieve it via the back seat. It was 10 minutes of nothing for me, but living Hell for her. I reckon she spends, bare bones minimum 2 or so hours everyday with her face in her phone. After 10 and a half days, she's lost a day of her life.

I have seen people so busy texting about an event they were at, that for the most part they didn't actually see the event. My daughter Sam is not alone. Most kids and a majority of adults probably do the same thing. They spend an inordinate amount of time in their device while the most precious gift they'll ever get, their life, is spinning on by. So what if someone told a story about taking what's happening now to the next logical step? I think it would be this film, Her.

This film takes place in the not distant future. Theodore was a man in his own private crisis. His wife had recently left him and divorce was imminent. He goes through his day at work by dictating letters into software that write it for people who order them through "Beautiful Handwritten Letters.Com" and then walks home with an earpiece in his ear, verbally telling his hand held computer (in his pocket), to "check my email" and the then commands "delete" to what he doesn't want or lets it read the message to him if he's interested. At home at night he plays holographic video games that swear at him, and confront him.

And then one day, he passes by a display, and on a whim buys an operating system. It is "the first operating system to incorporate artificial intelligence." He goes home and as he is installing it, it asks him questions about himself, but cuts him off when he gets too "wordy". I think it's because that was getting too human, but that's unimportant.

He opts for a female voice and during the first conversation he asks her to tell him her name. She comes right back with "Samantha". (Of course this blows me away....reference my daughter in the first couple paragraphs.) He asks why Samantha and she says that she'd scanned 850,000 names in one eighth of a second and liked that one the best.

As time goes on, Theodore grows closer and closer to Samantha, and they share things as friends that peak his interest. So much so, that when he goes on a date with a beautiful actual real live gorgeous woman, and she asks, (paraphrasing here)  "you're not just going to use me, and then never call again, are you?", Theodore hesitates, blowing that real life thing. But as time goes on, Samantha is his lover, his friend, his confidant, everything he ever wanted. And finally, he even lets people know that he has a girlfriend. He will drop in "she's nice, she's an operating system, she's funny...." This grows to the point that his friends actually wear ear-pieces and they all double date.

As they are meeting to sign divorce papers, there is a brief moment when he hopes his estranged wife won't sign, and she seems to hesitate, but then she signs. He's sad, but it's okay, he still has Samantha. He's glad that the complicated human thing is out of the way.

Theodore is friends with a couple down the hall, and during the course of events, they split and the wife also gets the operating system, and it becomes her very best friend. So this is beginning to go on with a lot of people.

Whenever Theodore is on the street, every person appears to be talking to themselves or looking into a device. If they aren't I assumed they were listening to their device. So Theo isn't an out of the ordinary guy.

Theodore goes on vacations with Samantha and is totally in love. And then, besides making a publishing deal for him without his knowledge, she introduces him to another "male" operating system. This is where things start to go awry. Without being a total spoiler, let's just say, even in cyberspace, love hurts. He asks, "Do you talk to other people?". She answers yes, 8,543." He asks, "Are you in love with any of them?" She replies, "Yes, 649." This breaks Theodore's heart and he begins his tailspin.

This is a powerful movie. It is a not-so-subtle look at today; it shows us how we act, and how we will act in the future. It is a perfect picture of today in a way, even of how we are all in this "alone together". But it extends it to the next level....to a very short time from now, when we abhor human interaction and where we will actually pay a company to write a personal letter to a loved one.

Joaquin Phoenix is absolutely incredible as always. I know he was upset about being robbed of the Oscar that was rightfully his for "Walk The Line", but I was with you pal. You owned it then, and you own it now. And an amazing part of this is that the voice of Samantha (Scarlett Johansen) wasn't dubbed in until after the movie was entirely shot. So Joaquin was playing off either nothing, or a grip reading the line. C'mon Academy, give it up. He is the man.

But the bigger picture is an intelligent look at a society gone crazy. I watched someone at a recent event so focused entirely on taking a picture every 7 seconds that he totally missed the event. He gave up real life for a look at what he might have seen. It was wondrous, right in front of him, but he gave that up for technology.

Her chickens out at the end, or lets say you can draw your own conclusions.

This is not on my list of Best Movies I Saw This Year for 2013, but since this is 2014, it will be next time.

This is one of those films I will be thinking about for a long, long time.

And you should too. Go see this.

Grade: A

Disclaimer: My wife saw this film and absolutely hated it, calling one of the most boring quiet films she's ever seen and was tempted to walk out. So there you go.