Spike Jonze
Her - Lei

Los Angeles, somewhere in the future. Lights dominate a city of steel, reflections of skyscrapers bounce off the horizon, digitization is now everywhere, every surface echoes that of a PC. People dress like in the '70s, write letters as a job, "play" with video games that interact directly with humans, people fall in love with an operating system. Theodore falls in love with an operating system and like him, many others in this indefinable society. It's easier to live in virtuality than in reality...

A multifaceted director who rose from music videos, Spike Jonze has managed to mark his name in recent American cinema. "Her," his latest feature film, can be considered as a movie of definitive artistic and stylistic maturity. Within it, we find a multitude of micro-realities that concatenate to create a touching, yet poetic and in some aspects "revolutionary" work. That operating system, "OS1," with which Theodore establishes a real relationship, is the mirror of our society, one where various screens have now interposed between people. Building an online life is now essential. It matters little if all this sometimes leads to a disconnect from everyday life. One "lives" nonetheless, even losing social life. Moreover, everything done in our times is designed to fit into this image and advertisement modernity. Even "falling in love is madness, it's like a socially acceptable form of insanity". And so it's better to relegate the sufferings of real life to the virtual (remember that Zuckerberg of "The Social Network"?), because in the end, the good Theodore Twombly has always and only loved Catherine, his ex-wife.

"Her" is an intimate work that masterfully combines the sentimental and social facets and delves much deeper than a "simple" love story. Theodore is the incarnation of the new alienated person of our society, no longer the worker of Marxian memory. Today, it's especially those who cannot relate to the world around them, who have doubts and fears, who are alienated.

Jonze creates a film of "high science fiction" that is not so far from reality, that excites and makes one think. He does so with the extraordinary cinematography by the Dutchman Hoyte Van Hoytema (already notable in Tomas Alfredson's "Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy") and lingering with close-ups and static shots, leaving room only sporadically for overhead shots of the splendid Los Angeles. Worth noting is also a superb Joaquin Phoenix, once again over the top after remarkable performances in films such as "The Master" and "Inherent Vice" (just to remain in recent years). An actor who has found an uncommon expressive maturity, here also distant from the borderline characters that suit him best.

A feature film that knows how to make itself loved even beyond a not always entirely credible subject matter. A modern-day love story. A film to discover and savor because every frame is where it should be.

P.S.
I'm not a purist of films in their original language, but in this case, I highly recommend watching the original for two reasons: the first is the sultry and warm voice of Scarlett Johansson and the second is the reckless choice to entrust the dubbing of the OS1 to Ramazzotti. Unlistenable.