Review of Materialists, directed by Celine Song

If you’re new here, and stumbled upon this blog through the mythical powers of the Internet, welcome! I know a lot of visitors to my website are people who randomly come upon this website through search engines like Google, but I also do have a lot of visitors who come back. Regardless: my name is Ashley, and I started this blog in order to keep track of everything I’m coming across in the world.

When it comes to blogging, or even watching movies and whatnot, I’ve been in such a weird headspace lately. I started a new job after quite a bit of a spell of not having any besides freelance and contract work, and now that I am actually working, I’m not watching as much as I used.

Part of it is fueled by my newfound YouTube addiction, but part of it just is that I can’t stay awake long enough to get everything I want done. I haven’t even been going to the movies lately to see them in-person because I simply am just tired after I get everything else done.

Call this a regular phase of corporate America and adulting, but I want to find a balance and go back more to the things I love. Sometimes life is simply trying to find a balance between the things that keep you alive, providing food, shelter, and warmth, and the things that you actually want to spend your life enjoying.

Anyways, my sister and I wanted to see Materialists when it was in theaters, but unfortunately our local theater didn’t have many screenings that worked with our schedules. So when it was added to HBO Max, we decided to spend a Saturday night on our living room couches and watch it together. I was quite excited, as I enjoyed Past Lives quite a bit, and Celine Song is a director I’ve been keeping an eye on for a while.

Let’s get into the review! I don’t want to ramble too much in the introduction, as I know these can get quite long and they’re not what you’re here for.

A New York City matchmaker finds herself caught between two men: the actor she left behind years ago, and a wealthy Wall Street guy who seems perfect.

Our main character in this movie is Lucy, who, at first, is seemingly living the perfect New York City life. She works as a matchmaker at an agency in the city, and is actually considered one of the more successful matchmakers here at the company. Everyone loves to celebrate her achievements, but Lucy herself has been single for the longest time and insists she’ll either die alone or marry rich.

Stormy waters are ahead of her when one of her clients scares away all of her prospects while simultaneously demanding perfection from the men she’s meeting. We’re specifically talking about a woman named Sophie, who, as Lucy meets her, is unable to understand that she might be part of the problem.

One of her clients is getting married and Lucy attends the wedding. It’s there that she catches the eye of Wall Street financier Harry, but first there’s something she has to attend to: her bride-to-be is getting cold feet. Lucy sits down and talks to the distraught girl, telling her that there’s a beautiful future ahead of her, despite her doubts, and calms her fears enough that the girl agrees to go on with the wedding.

Harry approaches Lucy after this fiasco. He’s the brother of the groom, and turns out she caught his attention with her matchmaking sales pitch. She brushes off his advances and tells him to become a client instead, but there’s a twist too: her ex-boyfriend John is working as a caterer at this wedding.

She goes outside with him and they talk about their relationship, which ended because she wanted stability and he wanted to continue working as an actor. Turns out he still lives in the same crummy apartment, still struggling with money, but at least he’s acting.

After this night, Harry continues to try and date Lucy. He takes her to all of these nice New York City restaurants, tells her flattering things, despite Lucy attempting to shut him down romantically. However, she eventually folds with all of the attention and agrees to be his girlfriend. Her life seems to be all roses then—until it’s not. She also continues dancing around John, including attending one of his shows with Harry.

At work, she sets her client Sophie up with a guy named Mark, who tells Lucy that it went well. But when Lucy goes into work one day, her boss calls her into her office and informs her that Sophie is suing the agency. Turns out she was assaulted on their date. Lucy wants to reach out, but her boss tells her no and says she should take four weeks off instead. Lucy doesn’t listen and finds Sophie in her neighborhood anyways, but she’s angry and devastated, blaming Lucy for what happened to her and says that she’s a pimp.

Harry prepares a trip to Iceland, and Sophie finds an engagement ring in the luggage. It’s then she starts realizing this isn’t going to work. When Harry reveals he got a $200,000 surgery to increase his height, she breaks up with him. He thinks at first it’s because of the surgery, but then she breaks it down for him: they check off all the right boxes for each other, but they’re just going through the motions.

Lucy seeks out John because her apartment has been subletted due to Iceland. He asks if they want to go upstate and she agrees. They find a wedding along the way that’s being catered by his company, and they attend as if they’re guests. John then asks if they’re getting back together, which Lucy seems hesitant about. He says though that despite their differences, he sees a future and love for her.

After having an earnest conversation, Sophie calls suddenly and says that Mark is outside her apartment and the police aren’t doing anything. John and Lucy drive back to the city, where Sophie is alone in her apartment, and Lucy helps Sophie file a restraining order. They have an honest conversation and become friends again, and when Lucy heads out in the morning, John is still there.

He asks her again if she wants to have a relationship again, then leaves her with that thought. The movie ends with revealing everything that’s happened to our characters. Sophie finds someone to date through the agency, while Harry has become a client to find someone for himself, too. Lucy is promoted to the head of the office, but she is debating resigning. John proposes to Lucy with a flower ring and Lucy accepts.

Overall Thoughts

I can see why there were mixed reactions to this movie, and I think this is one where people are either going to love or hate it. In terms of what works with it: I think it’s effective way to ruminate on modern dating, especially when we consider the friction between the New York City elite and the people who make the city a working class one.

We have people like Harry going the extra mile to try and seem more attractive to women and the people around him, while John doesn’t have much to offer but honesty. Lucy herself is someone who abandons her dreams of acting in order to become more financially comfortable, but she reconciles with this part of her life at the end of the movie.

I think this is a very human movie, too, considering all of the characters are show to have fairly deep flaws at the end of the day. Although Harry is kind of propped up to be this perfect human, we see that he’s not and has his own insecurities and anger at the end of the day too. And sometimes movies fail to see people as human—they’re complicated, messy beings.

I say watch it if it interests you and form your own opinion. What you might love could be someone else’s worst movie. Taste is so incredibly subjective!

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