The most distressing observation that Materialists makes about modern romance is that not much has changed since Elizabeth Bennet went on a quest to find a ‘single man in possession of a good fortune’ back in the 1800s. The business of marriage is still just that: a business, a financially motivated arrangement that many pretend is something purer. They do this to delude themselves into thinking that they aren’t as superficial as the sort of people they enjoy passing judgement at. In writer-director Celine Song’s highly anticipated second film, Dakota Johnson plays a rom-com version of Seema Taparia, a matchmaker who weighs her client’s ‘criteria’ and connects them with potential life partners with the dispassion of someone tying two shoelaces together.
The fault isn’t Johnson’s, but that of the script that she has been given — a script that harbours a fascination for the fantastic, but is too pragmatic to push past its own limitations. In that regard, it’s a lot like its protagonist, Lucy — she is constantly on the lookout for someone who is described in matchmaking parlance as a ‘unicorn’. This is the sort of man who could satisfy Poo with his good looks, good looks, and good looks, while sharing the same tax bracket as Mukesh Ambani. When Lucy finally finds one — Harry, played by Pedro Pascal — she keeps him for herself instead of matching him with one of her clients.
Around the same time, Lucy reconnects with her ex; John, played by Chris Evans. She discovers that he hasn’t exactly stepped out of the socio-economic class that they occupied together several years ago, when they were both struggling actors in New York. After Lucy discarded John for his perceived lack of ambition and — let’s not mince words — his poverty, she went on to become a put-together professional in the matchmaking industry. A flashback shows us how tumultuous Lucy and John’s relationship had become after a point. We catch them in a tense moment as they’re stuck in traffic, late for an important appointment.
Lucy berates John for bringing his car when he knew that he wouldn’t want to pay for parking. She tells him that they could simply have taken a cab, while also making it clear that she can afford parking just fine. There’s a sense that John insisted on driving only because Lucy had been passive-aggressively nagging him about it forever. His battered male ego couldn’t take her taunts anymore, and so, he drove both of them into a surefire argument. When they meet years later, she seems to be doing rather well for herself, while he’s still living with roommates in a ramshackle apartment, and working as a part-time waiter to fund his acting.
John represents everything that Lucy has moved on from in her life — he is the living manifestation of heart. Harry, on the other hand, represents logic. Lucy finds herself torn between them, and the two versions of herself that she has still not found a balance between. While her mind is drawn to Harry and his $12 million apartment, her heart directs her towards John. A love-triangle blossoms, as Song persuades us to root for perhaps the biggest red flag protagonist since Junaid Khan in Maharaj. Because Materialists adheres to romantic comedy conventions, it leaves Lucy with no option but to choose John at the end. Lucy’s decision, however unbelievable, is meant to suggest that she is finally following her heart again, after having carefully calibrated her lifestyle around materialism.
Shockingly, however, a climax designed to draw oohs, aahs and awws did the opposite. It left younger audiences — the movie is about millennials — disappointed in Lucy’s choice. She should’ve gone for Harry, they declared on TikTok and Reels, even though the movie had made it clear that they didn’t really have feelings for each other. They ranted and raged about it, revealing not only their lack of media literacy, but also basic decency. They even called it ‘broke man propaganda’, which sounds like a term that Manu Joseph might come up with. How could Lucy choose someone who is incapable of bringing material value to her life; does she not recognise her own worth? The film’s detractors seemed to be completely overlooking the fact that John genuinely seems to like her, while Harry views her as a lost sock, finally united with its partner.
It’s odd to observe that the Gen Z’s view of romance seems to mimic that of the Boomers. Only a social anthropologist can explain why the melancholic Millennials haven’t had the idealism beaten out of them. This trait is what leads them, and perhaps the 36-year-old Song as well, to demand a grand correction for Lucy. However, what about the condescension with which she simply offloaded John in the first place, like he was a sandal whose heel had snapped off? She made him feel inferior for not meeting society’s standards. She ridiculed him, belittled him, and ultimately dumped him. When they run into each other, years later, it’s clear that he’s still hung up on her. What’s also clear is that Materialists is trying to go against its own core by trying to ship them as a couple. They’re incompatible; they won’t last more than six months. John will be heartbroken again; Lucy will realise that she was never a romantic in the first place.
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She’s only two films old, but Song views women as particularly cold creatures. Her sympathies are always with the men around them. In her breakout movie, Past Lives, the female protagonist leaves her unambitious childhood love behind in Korea and moves to America, hungry for a better life. She gets married to a lovely guy, but her sudden decision seems to bring her old partner’s life to a grinding halt. He continues living in Korea, going through the motions of life in a daze; he simply cannot understand why she couldn’t have waited for him. Was her ambition greater than the love they shared?
In Past Lives, this idea was implied. But, in Materialists, it is explicit. Lucy’s unbelievable transformation at the end is unearned; it is impossible to imagine that someone so set in their classist ways could ever view a real human being with basic empathy. She lays conditions for him when they get back together at the end of the movie; he must find a ‘real job’ if he wants to be with her. As if being a struggling actor is somehow inferior to being an investment banker. Who decides? The same society that views its poor as a burden? There’s an argument to be made that women simply have to be pragmatic in this big, bad world. But that’s an argument for another time, waiting to be made by somebody else.
Post Credits Scene is a column in which we dissect new releases every week, with particular focus on context, craft, and characters. Because there’s always something to fixate about once the dust has settled.
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