Materialists

Director: Celine Song 
Starring: Dakota Johnson, Chris Evans, Pedro Pascal, Zoë Winters, Marin Ireland, Dasha Nekrasova, Louisa Jacobson, Eddie Cahill, Sawyer Spielberg, Joseph Lee, John Magaro
Running Time: 117 min.
Rating: R

★★★ ½ (out of ★★★★) 

Going by its wildly misleading trailers, you might expect Celine Song's Materialists to be an unremarkable rom-com centering around a love triangle full of goofy misunderstandings and tired tropes. What we get instead is a compelling, shrewdly written romantic drama with an IQ twice the size of other offerings in the genre. And that's evident in a scene where its matchmaker protagonist lists all the reasons she's wrong for her date, spouting off the same calculations and criteria she uses with her clients. But when a similar scenario plays out later with a different guy, so much has happened in between she's no longer the same person, her entire perspective altered by a single event.

Song, whose 2023 semi-autobiographical debut Past Lives quietly landed a Best Picture nomination, hasn't exactly gone more mainstream with her follow-up, nor has she "sold out," an especially ironic assertion considering the film's themes. In fact, it's refreshingly outside the box for a commercial release featuring these stars, all of whom play real, relatable characters who can't stop themselves from making believably human mistakes. Ultimately though, it's a timely examination about connecting, told through an emotionally detached woman so skilled at her job that it affects her entire outlook on relationships.

Successful matchmaker Lucy Mason (Johnson) works at Adore, an elite company in New York City that sets clients up based on a number of specific criteria, including age, income, height and level of attractiveness. A self proclaimed "voluntary celibate," she's committed to being alone, unless a really rich guy comes along and changes her mind. But while meticulously ensuring her clients' prospective dates check all the right boxes, Lucy struggles to find a match for the recently rejected Sophie (Zoë Winters), who she's come to view as her own personal challenge.    

Frustrated by everyone's unrealistic standards for a long-term partner, Lucy attends a client's wedding and meets the groom's wealthy brother Harry Castillo (Pedro Pascal), who's immediately more interested in her than signing up for a dating service. After charming Lucy over, she reluctantly agrees to go out with him, just as her ex-boyfriend John Finch (Chris Evans), an aspiring actor, reappears, jogging up memories of their break-up years ago over money issues. But as Lucy's relationship with the seemingly perfect Harry grows more serious, an unexpected catastrophe occurs, forcing the cynical matchmaker to take a closer look at everything she thought she knew about life and love.

Methodically building her story and its main character, Song kicks this off with a 2001-inspired opening that shows a prehistoric cave couple committing to each other. But as opposed to apes, these early humans are further along in their development, discovering what they want and how that affection can be bought. So when the action seamlessly cuts to busy, bustling present day New York, we soon find out just how little has changed, forming the basis for how Lucy and others can often cripple under  societal expectations. 

Lucy's pitches to prospective clients is unusually strong, in no small part due to a blunt delivery that convinces us she makes them feel important and seen. Adopting an almost mathematical method when it comes dating, there's no denying her commitment, which sets the stage for the film's ethical dilemma. And from the moment she first appears, Johnson owns the screen with a sincerity that's business-like, but hard to fake, even when the character's lying. Because of this, the setup's whole appeal comes in us wondering what in Lucy's past led her down a path where statistics trump feelings. 

Upon meeting her match in Harry, a conflict develops between who Lucy was and what she wants to be, doing everything in her power to avoid the attraction. But as someone who's also in a profession revolving around facts and figures, he sees right through her defense mechanism, demonstrating how little she actually differs from the clients she goes to bat for on a daily basis. 

It's all about feeling valued, and while Harry definitely does that for Lucy, John's reemergence does something else entirely, and it isn't all positive, especially considering he hasn't changed at all since both were aspiring actors financially struggling to make it in their twenties. Sharing a cheap apartment with a couple of aimless roommates, he now working as a caterer and waiter as Lucy tries to convince herself she's moved on. 

Under normal circumstances, we'd have the ideal ingredients for a love triangle where the career woman is torn between her flawed ex and the rich, charming playboy. But that's all a red herring for the major incident that shakes Lucy to her core, forcing her to take serious stock. And though the film undergoes a titanic shift that nearly takes this into thriller territory, Song retains command of the controls, asking a lot of Johnson, who really comes through with a versatile turn. 

While Johnson's been grinding it out in populist projects and edgy indie fare, this feels like the best balance of both, prompting audiences to see her in a new light and get a glimpse of just how adaptable she is as an actress. And for all the flak Pascal gets for popping up in everything these days, his portrayal of the suave, direct Harry serves as an ideal reminder why, showing us exactly what he adds in the right part.

Appearing to have it all, Harry carries a secret that encapsulates the picture's materialistic slant and masks people wear. He's a decent guy, just not someone who takes his own advice, complicating a process he even admits should be easy and effortless. Evans' likable John wears his heart on his sleeve over how things with Lucy ended, but that rift is as much about his insecurity as her judgmentalism. It's only when they're given an opportunity to meet in the middle about their problems that a chance comes to finally settle them.  

After getting the impression Lucy's smart and talented enough to do anything, it isn't long before we're asking why she's doing this. And soon enough she's exploring the same question herself in a prescient film that says a lot, but gets its biggest boost from Johnson, who delivers her most nuanced work to date. Far from predictable in either tone or execution, she's the anchor for a thought provoking look at compatibility that goes layers deeper than you'd expect from its plot description.