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| Credit: Her |
Days after the Academy Awards concluded, I watched the movie “Her.” A lot of people have been raving about it and I felt that it was the kind of movie that would fit perfectly for me. So, I thought it was about time I watch it. OK, I am lying. My buddy Ferdie told me he recently watched it with his wife and was saying it was a philosophical mindfuck. To prevent him from further spoiling the rest of the movie to me (as what most friends would do), I decided to avoid further frustrations and watched it instead. OK, just kidding, Ferdie. The philosophical mindfuck with the addition of knowing that Olivia Wilde, Rooney Mara and Amy Adams were in it was just too good a thing to resist.
I never regretted the decision to watch it.
“Her” is a futuristic movie about a soon-to-be-divorced introvert named Theodore Twombly. He is a romantic guy who writes love letters for his day job. One day, Theodore came across and bought the latest technological innovation - the new operating system named OS1. It boasts of having an artificially intelligent operating system. He could chat with it (named Samantha) as if it were a normal human being. Samantha could set up dates for him or could even listen to his day-to-day ramblings. Theodore grew to like this computer to the point that he spent most of his days talking with it even if other people are around. Samantha was a complete match for Theodore personality-wise (as it was programmed to fit the user) so it was easy for him to share the same “feelings” with it. Eventually, they fell in love with each other. Theodore even got to share his experience with Samantha with his friends. Apparently, his longtime friend, Amy, also had her operating system after she and her boyfriend broke up.
There were times when the film showed Theodore dating his computer at a beach surrounded by several people. There were lots of people he could converse with, but he was so into his computer that the world did not matter to him.
The movie for most of its parts was sad. Theodore was too focused on Samantha to the point that he became out of reach with society. Sure, he shared Samantha with his friends but Theodore’s world revolved around a computer. As it had limitations, there were awkward moments when Samantha tried to get a human to volunteer as her replacement for sexual activity. Brutal. When Theodore’s ex-wife (played by Rooney Mara) found out that he is in a relationship with a computer, she was extremely disappointed in him. However, this did not stop him from continuing his relationship with the computer.
It all came into an end when Samantha realized one day that she had to part ways with Theodore. It was a heartbreaking ending where it eventually showed Theodore and Amy consoling each other.
Analysis
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| Credit: Her |
The cast was strong enough. There were just a handful of key characters but that was pretty much what was needed. After all, he is a lonely antisocial dude so his circle of friends had to be a small one. Amy Adams, Rooney Mara and Olivia Wilde were able to do just right aside from being eye candies. As for Scarlett Johansson’s voice? Epic. That’s one helluva sexy voice. Most of the time, she was on bedroom voice so that was an A++++ for me.
Oh by the way, is it just me or does Amy Adams look like Meg Ryan in this movie?
The futuristic environment was portrayed quite right in this flick. I liked the fact that they did not overdo it with effects just to make a point. The fashion was also realistically futuristic (in the sense that it did not deviate a lot from current attire unlike what old futuristic movies tried to do). It is strange to have a beltless society though.
The movie was superb but what made it transcend for me was its message.
Reflection
Time for the heavy stuff. The beauty of this movie is that I could interpret it in a lot of ways. I have not read reviews on this yet (and have been avoiding to). This is because I want to reflect on its message purely based on what I realized on it. I actually compared notes with Ferdie because his wife Madz was able to capture some insightful stuff that I was not even able to grasp when I watched it.
The beauty of art is that you can interpret it in a lot of ways. Moreover, if it could deliver it without you overanalyzing it. It just comes to your senses naturally and the way it invokes unique, different feelings from other people makes it all the more better. That was how I viewed “Her.”
I am not a fan of experts saying there is only one interpretation of a movie/story especially if that can be viewed in many ways so if you are wondering why I am discussing it in various viewpoints, you would understand where I am coming from.
Love
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| Theodore staying alone in a beach | Credit: Her |
Perspective B: Isn’t love supposed to be crazy? Shouldn’t it be irrational that you do not even care what other people think of you? It was why it was surreal watching Theodore bond with his computer outdoors even if he could easily strike a conversation with the thousands of people in there. If you are deeply in love with someone, it comes to a point that there is one person that matters. And that was what I saw on that beach scene.
Perspective A: It is true that Theodore’s relationship with Samantha made him a very happy person. But, was he genuinely happy? There were several moments in the movie (even if they did not have a dialogue explicitly stating it) where you could feel that there is something lacking between the two. You just know it would not end well. It was why it was very depressing. Their sex was sad and pathetic. The idea that Samantha does not have real feelings made their relationship hard to qualify as ‘love.’
The fact that Theodore possessed Samantha easily debunks the idea that there was love between them. Part of being in love with someone is also the idea that this being is also distant from you. That you do not have full control of it. This is why we hope when we love – we do not expect. If you love someone, you let the person be and you hope that the person would reciprocate to you. The idea that Samantha was created to be of Theodore’s taste made it too manipulative for me. Samantha was too perfect a thing for Theodore because it was programmed matched his personality quite well. That’s not love. No one is perfect for anyone. There would always be flaws that one might not like from another. That is why there is such a thing as understanding and compromise.
According to my buddy Ferdie, Madz pointed out that one of the reasons why Theodore’s relationship with his wife did not work was Theodore wanted his wife to change for him. I totally agree on that. He could have gotten what he wanted from Samantha because it was tailor-fitted for him but he missed the point in his relationship with his ex-wife. News flash: If you love someone, you should not expect the person to change for you. There will always be imperfections and it is a matter of if you could live with those or not. People change and you hope for the best, but never expect the person to change to conform to what you want. The moment you decide to fall in love to someone is the moment you learn to accept the complication that comes with it. Yup, it will always have some complications of some sort – big or small. It is a matter of you accepting it.
This is why there is always a significant risk when you love someone. The problem with Theodore and Samantha’s relationship was, it offered little risk because she was programmed to be for him. That does not happen when one person meets another person no matter how “perfect” you feel you are for one another.
Perspective B: There were actually complications for both Theodore and Samantha. A lot of complications even. It was not a traditional love complication but the fact that Samantha was not a real human being was a huge complication that Theodore had come to accept. He even bypassed one of the crucial things in a relationship: the Physical Test. I am not being shallow but let’s face it – it is usually a necessity that both human beings should be physically attracted to one another to some extent to fall in love (To those saying what about the “True Love Scenario where one is obviously out of the league of someone”: That’s why I put the word ‘usually’ but anyway, beauty is in the eye of the beholder). Maybe not an outrageous attraction, but there has to be some sort of level that needs to be reached for that.
The idea that Samantha never had real feelings was also a huge complication. Theodore learned to compromise on that. Maybe, Samantha being a CPU made no sense to be something someone should fall for. But maybe, it represented the lover whom you think is of some vastly different background than you. Or maybe, her CPU limitation complication represented some kind of “there’s really no way this could work long term” thing. I don’t know. My head hurts.
But here is the thing, isn’t Theodore’s relationship with Samantha a reflection of the famous “love knows no boundaries” statement? Other than which, the idea that Theodore accepted Samantha’s complications just reinforced the thinking that if there is a will, there is a way. The irony was, in the end, Samantha lost her will to push it forward. That or she realized that she could not offer Theodore the real human love experience which was what she learned from the AI that was patterned after a poet/philosopher
Technology
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| Credit: Her |
It is amazing how technology advances our lives. It has made things so much easier and faster for us. I can still remember watching MTV or Channel V for hours when I was in high school for the chance to watch my favorite music videos. Right now, you can watch it on non-stop loop in Youtube. Half a decade ago, people would write letters to each other so they could communicate to someone 10,000 miles away. In the present time, it just takes a split second for you to send one message to someone or even to multiple people. You have various ways of doing that, whether it be via email, text message, internet messenger, video call or phone call.
“Her” expounds the technological perspective further with its futuristic take. In it, people talk to their computers instead of using keyboards. You could look at it as our possible future or you could look at it as a reflection of how our present time has evolved from before.
“Her” featured a guy falling in love with his operating system. In turn, he became isolated with society. He went to places where people usually bond with each other, but he was too focused on his computer that the world around him did not matter. On his idle time, all he did was either play a computer game or talk to his computer.
Sure, technology made it easier for him, but I find myself asking the question: Has technology really advanced our lives or has it actually put us a step back from our humanity? It is actually strange that I asked this question a decade ago to my high school friends’ email group (where I would think some of my friends might have thought I was nuts – yup, why the eff would you ask that stuff in an email group in the first place? I am eccentric).
Probably 97.5% of the time, technology has advanced our lives. I am not discounting that fact. The way I am conveying my message right now is through the means of technology. It does make things easier and more effective. Technology is seemingly limitless in improving people’s lives. Hey, who does not want to communicate with a bunch of people simultaneously? Technology does that to us and that surely taps into our human side, right? Yes. We have several venues for communication nowadays and I do not think that old school ways of communicating would beat these.
But there comes a point when technology does not actually advance us in some sort. This is the finite point. That was my realization when Theodore got out of touch with reality. He was a happy person but he was communicating to a non-being. He was conversing with an object that was driven by randomness and programming logic. Call me old school but the idea that he was not able to reach out with other people in his society was just plain sad. (For him, it might not be because the paradigm may have changed by that time)
But consider this: once you listen to your iPod when you are outside, you enjoy what technology brings you but at the same time, you lose a bit of touch of your outside world. The music floods your hearing sense and it also discourages other people from striking a conversation with you because you are preoccupied. When you come to your office wearing your earphones, do you greet the security guard a good morning? You may contend that you could put down your earphones when you want to talk to someone. But, what about on the times you wear that? You cut off the chance that other people could communicate with you.
Do not get me wrong, I am guilty of doing that too. This is the reality. As my buddy Ferdie told me in our discussions, “Her” portrays the future where people are disconnected with each other. A bit ironic because the technological advancements there are supposed to make people connected with each other. Ferdie even quips that he does not want to talk to his phone twenty years from now. Totally agree. I want to be talking to a human being, not a gadget that blurts out words as commanded by programming logic. But you know what, we are slowly getting there. Every time you pull out your phone while you are having a dinner with someone, you are slowly building a habit of relying on your gadget. You lose a bit of the communication flow with the people/person you are with.
In the end, there are two ways of looking at this: either you embrace this change or you stay with the traditional past. Our present is like the TV show “Mad Men” where people either evolve with their world or get stuck with the past. Change is good and technology seemingly has limitless ways of improving our lives, but we should also realize that it still is limited and can only touch our lives to a certain point.
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