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Words are actions, as anyone who has ever been told “I do” or “You’re fired” knows. Yet after nearly a century of talking pictures, most filmmakers fail to present dialogue with the same energy or creativity as physical action. The bulk of the work often falls to the actors: the traditional version of film involves scenes with actors performing, like audiovisual fragments of a theater play. This may explain why some of the most engaging approaches to dialogue in cinema come from directors who began as playwrights and are therefore acutely aware of the differences when they turn their attention to the screen—whether Sacha Guitry or Rainer Werner Fassbinder or Kenneth Lonergan. Add one more name to that list: Celine Song, whose second feature, The Materialists, represents a significant artistic step up from her debut, Past Lives. Both films offer dialogue in abundance, but the earlier one took a much more subdued approach to writing and filming; the new film, in turn, shows striking inspiration in both Song's dialogue writing and the way she gives that dialogue a cinematic uniqueness.
The triangular structure of The Materialists is similar to Past Lives. In both films, a woman's romantic relationship with a man is overshadowed by the appearance of another man with whom she had a previous affair. In The Materialists, Dakota Johnson plays Lucy Mason, a professional matchmaker in Manhattan who, at a client's wedding, meets the groom's brother, Harry Castillo (Pedro Pascal), a wealthy partner in the family investment firm. She wants him as a client; he asks her out. She agrees to go on a date with Harry, and the two begin a romance. However, at the wedding, she also runs into an ex-boyfriend, John Pitts (Chris Evans), a struggling actor who is working as a waiter at the event. Lucy rekindles her friendship with John, and when she faces a work crisis (more on that later), she confides in him over Harry, a choice that doesn't create tension but merely reflects their dynamic.
What’s so impressive about The Materialists, and what quickly sets it apart not just from Past Lives but from a lot of romantic films, whether dramas or comedies (and The Materialists barely fits into either category), is the business. Song used to work as a matchmaker, and it shows: the film feels built on a solid grounding in its subject: Lucy knows what she’s talking about, and Song knows what Lucy isn’t talking about. Lucy has a gift for discussing her work, both candidly and thoughtfully when she’s selling her services and when she’s describing them to acquaintances—and the blurry line between the two modes makes for some subtle psychological twists. Early on, Lucy is chatting with other wedding guests about matchmaking and the central theme that accompanies it, love, while Harry stands alone, close enough to eavesdrop but far enough away to remain in the shadows. As he listens, the musical notes seem to float around the room, cartoon-style, from Lucy's lips to Harry's ears. He falls in love with her thoughts before he even meets her. When he notices her sitting alone at the singles table, he finds his card and places it next to hers. They quickly hit it off, his politeness and her bracing directness sparking in lively dialogue. Their verbal chemistry is so intense that they practically dance together without even moving.
Lucy is a former actress, and her skills and discipline as a performer are key to her successful career and to the impression she makes on Harry – and everyone around her. She has a controlled posture, she knows how to read people, and she can improvise the right sales pitch or conversational ploy. How much does Lucy believe in her own schtick? Is she a persuasive salesperson because she’s a master at putting on a show with a clear sense of what will work, or because she speaks from the heart and believes in her services and how they work? It’s unclear – because Song gives little insight into who Lucy is beyond her profession – but for about half the film, Lucy’s performance is riveting. The ease with which she allows herself to become trapped in her rhetoric and become, along with Harry, her own de facto client is dramatically dizzying.
When Lucy talks about matchmaking, she deftly translates the emotional fantasy of romance into businesslike concepts and terms, making the ineffable mysteries of love accessible through a hard, tabulated practicality. This dualism invests her high-flown and dreamy advertising slogans with a philosophical weight of a very specific kind, which the French writer Stendhal put aphoristically: “A banker who has made a fortune has one trait of character necessary for making discoveries in philosophy, namely, to see clearly what is.” Her personality could almost have been purposefully created to open the vault of Harry’s heart. There is a wonderful moment when, in response to Lucy’s provocative questions about their relationship, Harry says that she is the woman he wants.
Sourse: newyorker.com
