Materialists

Match Me If You Can

Lucy (Dakota Johnson) is an observant and dedicated matchmaker with a specialty in getting her clients to admit those hard-home truths they’d otherwise never say out loud: “He makes my sister jealous,” Lucy’s client Charlotte (Louisa Jacobson) tearfully admits on her wedding day. “That makes me feel great because it means I’ve won.”  Lucy works for an Elite matchmaking service, “Adore,” alongside her boss Violet (Marin Ireland), co-worker Daisy (Dasha Nekrasova), and other women who idolize Lucy for her seemingly effortless ability to make successful matches look so easy. There has been a lack of success in her past. She’s a failed actress who broke off her five-year relationship with aspiring actor and cater waiter John (Chris Evans) on their anniversary, overwhelmed by their financial difficulties. 

Lucy maintains that through voluntary celibacy, she will only date and eventually marry a rich man. She meets a potential match for Adore in the form of Pedro Pascal’s Harry, Charlotte’s new brother-in-law. Despite Lucy’s best efforts, Harry refuses to become a new client, wanting instead to date Lucy himself. Lucy admits he makes her feel valuable and surrenders to the courtship. 

Despite feelings of guilt and confusion upon reconnecting with John, all is bliss for Lucy. Until it isn’t. She starts to doubt her professional capabilities upon discovering that one of her clients, Sophie (Zoe Winters), was assaulted by her match on their first date, and she is now suing Adore. As Lucy struggles to cope with the fallout and her arguable role in it, she is forced to confront her own life and re-analyze the choices she realizes she hasn’t fully made yet. 

Materialists marks Celine Song’s second collaboration with A24 and is, of course, her sophomore film. The cinephilic sentimentality of her brilliance regarding her debut feature, Past Lives, is apparent throughout every moment of Materialists. Materialists is heavily based on Song’s own experiences working as a matchmaker as she was forging her film career. It’s almost as though Song is this lovely phantom, and you feel her pull towards you as you watch her work. You see what she wants you to see, and yet, it’s never forced. 

She has lots of amazing qualities as a filmmaker, and one of them is her commitment to individual scenes, whilst never losing sight of the bigger picture. Writing is her best attribute. Specifically, the dialogue and how she wants that dialogue to be shot. She opts to shoot very pivotal moments from multiple perspectives as the camera lingers on all characters with their faces shown halfway. Lucy verbalizing her feelings to Harry that he can do better than her is such a shot, and it’s a mesmerizing brushstroke of excellence that only adds more color to the waters of Materialists. Another is the long pauses the characters take in what often look like simple moments but mean a great deal more. Less is always more, and Song is sure audiences are reminded of that.

The acting is truly lovely. Johnson is easily and perhaps uncomfortably relatable as Song’s heroine. Lucy (Nor the film for that matter) is never portrayed as cynical or cold with regards to her views on money and relationships. She has such a raw honesty to herself and to her worldviews that in the hands of another actor and filmmaker, could very easily come off as shallow and manipulative. But because it’s Dakota Johnson and Celine Song, you know you’re going to get the very heart of the human being and the angst that’s eating away at them. Evans and Pascal are exceptional as her two suitors, and there’s no silly rivalry between them that we’ve seen in rom-coms done and done again. They both have their own lives outside of Lucy, and yet, she holds a very special role in both of them. Pascal especially really stands out in a beautifully touching scene in his kitchen in the early hours of the morning, that’s saddening, humorous, and hopeful all at once. 

Succession’s Zoe Winters is also memorable as Sophie. One could rightfully worry that her role would be reduced to that of a character whose sole existence is to create a challenge for the main character, but Song avoids this altogether, and a heartbreaking scene between her and Johnson in the aftermath of her abusive date is one audiences won’t soon forget. As for Marin Ireland, what can I say? She’s a natural who stands out in everything she does, and one always hopes she’ll pop up unexpectedly in any story. Here, she remains grounded and truthful as someone who’s been in Lucy’s shoes many times and feels for her. It’s a very unforced and non-judgmental portrayal of mentorship. 

Materialists is more realistic and truthful than most films of this nature usually are willing to explore, and yet, it’s never too dark that we forget it’s a rom-com. The beginning and closing scenes are so clever in how they intertwine, it’d be cruel of me to spoil it.  The petty clientele Lucy has to deal with are among the film’s funniest moments. It’s hard to believe before watching those scenes that people like this exist, but then you immediately realize that they do. One loses oneself in laughter over the absurdity of the requests. 

Materialists is a pleadingly hopeful film, a stepping stone that’s bound to ease audiences into a conversation that they themselves may not be fully ready to partake in. The choice to contemplate the longevity of companionship and what constitutes love is a grand gesture of humanity by meeting people where they are, as opposed to where we think they should be. Rather than rub in our faces the natural human instinct to run away from risk and make us feel guilty for it, Song embraces the messy imperfections of the human condition in our post-COVID era. We’re all bound to face many more disappointments to come, but the true beauty of Materialists is that human beings are investments and we ought all have the right to make the right one for us now.