Literary journal Overland today published my review of the new Spike Jonze film, Her. It’s my first paid byline (closely following my first byline, on Saturday) so that’s quite nice.
It’s not your typical review, I guess. I’m more interested in exploring the themes and ideas raised, and my reaction to them, than the nuances of the plot or the performances.
The nutshell version is that the film is fabulous – go and watch it. If you don’t like reading reviews before seeing a film, like me, come back later and have a read.
The first two pars of the review as a spoiler-free preview:
Leaving the cinema this week after watching Her, the new Spike Jonze film, three strong urges came over me, one after the other. The first was to walk back in and watch the very next session of the film. I’d been so overwhelmed by the sophistication of what Jonze had made I felt compelled to immerse myself in that wonderful world again.
Jonze is already well known among film-lovers, for quirky-surrealist collaborations with screenwriter Charlie Kaufman, Being John Malkovitch (1999) and Adaptation (2002), and for his bold adaptation of Maurice Sendak’s seminal children’s bookWhere the Wild Things Are (2009). I love all these films, but Her sees Jonze stamp out new territory as an auteur, in my view, perhaps facilitated by the level of control afforded by being both screenwriter and director.
Read the full piece (and go nuts with all that sharing business) here:
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