© 2AM, Killer Films, A24 and Stage 6 Films

Materialists – Film Review

Cast: Dakota Johnson, Pedro Pascal, Chris Evans, Zoë Winters

Director: Celine Song

Synopsis: In the hustle and bustle of New York City, a matchmaker finds herself torn between a wealthy and charming financier and her ex…

Review: What if two people who at one time in their lives were deeply in love and were seemingly destined to be together, only for their trajectories to split? This was the philosophical question that beat at the heart of Celine Song’s reflective and heart-achingly beautiful directorial debut, Past Lives, and how those two people reckon with what might have been had their lives taken a different direction. Love is very much at the centre of her follow-up, grounded in the world of dating and matchmaking, with the vibrant and lively atmosphere of the city that never sleeps again serving as the backdrop.

Lucy Mason (Johnson) is a self-proclaimed “eternal bachelorette” matchmaker working for ADORE, providing dating services for high-paying clientele. She has seen incredible success in her career, having matched nine couples who tied the knot. However, she insists she won’t walk down the aisle herself unless she meets someone wealthy. At a client’s wedding, she encounters the groom’s brother Harry (Pascal) and also runs into her ex-boyfriend, John, who works as a waiter for a catering firm while trying to become an actor. Lucy faces a dilemma between starting a promising new relationship with Harry or rekindling the romance with her old flame.

As was the case with her directorial debut, Song delves much deeper beyond the surface of what one might expect from a typical romantic comedy where two souls meet and fall in love with each other. This is encapsulated through an unconventional opening scene that is bound to catch some people off guard, yet it completely illustrates the nature of the story. Humanity’s age-old adventure to find connection, passion, romance and the hope of finding the special person we would like to fall head over heels in love with and wish to spend the rest of our lives with. Sometimes it’s a case of being in the right place at the right time and everything falls effortlessly into place.

However, in the modern world, finding a partner often reduces to persistent scrolling through apps, all in the hope of discovering that elusive dream match. But what truly defines the “perfect someone”? Is it their job, height, hobbies, or the music they listen to? Or perhaps even more specific criteria than that? The dating world is competitive and cutthroat, where everything on a profile has to be flawless in a world where people are filled to the brim with flaws and imperfections. Can a matchmaker really effectively use these various criteria to connect individuals with their ideal partners? This is the central question that Song addresses with unwavering honesty.

Johnson is an actor whose choice of projects (as she herself will tell you) has left a lot to be desired in recent years. It was clear that she had talent, but just needed the right script, and with those aligning, she gives one of her best performances as Lucy. Working in the field of matchmaking requires someone to be cool, calm and collected and the ultimate professional, even when dealing with picky and demanding clients. However, she remains unflustered in her attempts to find partners for that “check all the boxes”. Yet despite her success, she struggles to find the right partner for herself, even when someone as charming and downright handsome as Harry enters her life and goes out of his way to woo her. Pascal makes full use of his limited screentime and brings effortless suave and smouldering good looks. John may not have the same level of wealth as the other man trying to win Lucy’s heart, but Evans also brings charisma and charm aplenty.

When depicting love triangles on screen, human nature often leads us to root for one side to prevail over the other. However, Song’s script takes a balanced approach and allows the audience to understand the perspectives of all parties involved. It would be easy to assume Lucy would go for the man who has all the wealth in the world, but it is considerably more nuanced and complicated. There is, however, a subplot featuring one of Lucy’s clients, Sophie (Winters), which highlights the challenges and all too real dangers women, in particular, can face when dating a male partner and the risk of that partner getting abusive and or violent. While this may hit too close to home for some, it needed to be addressed, and more screentime could have been given to exploring this peril of the dating minefield.

It doesn’t quite pack the emotionally devastating punch as Past Lives, but take nothing away from what Celine Song has achieved. With only her second film, here is a director quickly gaining a reputation for bringing thoughtful and mature romances to the screen. Stories filled with resonant storytelling that make us pause and reflect on our lives, the people we love, and how do we possibly go about finding the one we are looking for in such a crazy, chaotic world where people are motivated by money and material possessions? A universal struggle that humanity has been grappling with throughout the aeons of human history, even for folks as mesmerisingly attractive as its three leading characters.

Bolstered by three excellent performances from its bewitchingly beautiful cast, Materialists offers a sincere and unflinching look at the complicated maze of online dating and humanity’s eternal quest to find romance in an increasingly avaricious world.

Past Lives – Film Review

Cast: Greta Lee, Teo Yoo, John Magaro

Director: Celine Song

Synopsis: Two childhood friends in Korea reconnect years later after one of their families migrated to North America…

Review: As human beings, we have all likely gone through that moment where we have imagined what would have happened had certain decisions we made in our lives been different. Could certain events, or maybe even the whole direction of our lives transpired differently than how they turned out? Would we have lived in a different place, landed on a different career path or met and fallen in love with someone else entirely? These are the questions and ruminations which beat at the heart of this quiet, thoughtful and stunning directorial debut from Celine Song.

Growing up together at a school in Seoul, Na Young and Hae Sung were classmates and childhood sweethearts who seemed destined to spend the rest of their lives together. However, their lives are taken in two different directions when Na Young’s family emigrates to Canada. Flash forward 12 years and Na Young – now going by the name Nora – is a playwright living in New York, while Hae Sung remained in Korea to study engineering. A chance search on social media allows the two of them to reconnect online but, Nora chooses to cease contact so both can focus on their careers. After a further 12 years pass, Kae Sung travels to New York to meet Nora in person, where they contemplate their time together in Korea, how their lives have turned out and ponder what might have been had they stayed together.

For as long as cinema has existed, there have been countless films which have explored romance, relationships and the complicated emotions that can form when two souls who seemed destined to be together are torn apart. Celine Song’s semi-autobiographical screenplay approaches its subject matter in a way which feels uniquely original and accomplishes this without coming across as overly sentimental. The exploration of a Korean concept known as “in-yeon”, where two souls during a chance encounter might have meant something much more to each other in a previous life, sounds quite soppy. Song’s script adds rich layers of emotional depth with a tinge of melancholy, to this heart-achingly beautiful story of romance, longing for a life we’ve never lived, and a rumination of the events which shape our lives.

As the central character of this exquisite love story, Greta Lee is terrific as Nora. We see how throughout her life, she is resolute in her ambition to achieve her goals as a playwright and initially seemed sure of who she would marry in the early stages of her life. However, when it comes to her personal life, she becomes torn between her childhood crush and Arthur (Magaro), the man she married after the two met on a writer’s retreat. The scenes between her and Hae are tenderly portrayed with often periods of silent reflection between them because sometimes silence says more than words ever could. Crucially, the film never strays into any melodrama particularly where Arthur is concerned as he could have been portrayed as a villain. However, Magaro’s layered performance ensures that the audience views him sympathetically as he understands the connection that once existed between his wife and Hae when they were young and doesn’t get in the way of the tender moments between these two former lovers.

The poignant score by Christopher Bear and Daniel Rossen reinforces the wistful and moving nature of the central story, to which Song bides her time and paces things deliberately slowly to allow the relationships between the central three characters to take their course. Sometimes, the most powerful stories come from our own experiences that we encounter during our journey through this mad, crazy and sometimes beautiful world that we live in. Those complicated, layered emotions from those moments where we find pastures new, meet and fall in love, and through no fault of our own, are forced to part ways are captured so succinctly by Song. Like its central characters, this is a film which will likely leave audiences deep in thought and reflection on their own lives once the credits start to roll.

A beautiful and profound character study of the complexities of the emotional and romantic bonds which shape the course of our lives. A masterful directorial debut from Celine Song.