"Her" (2013) Directed by Spike Jonze

“The past is just a story we tell ourselves”.

Alexa — Please show me a dystopian future!

Following his previous collaborations with Charlie Kaufman and Dave Eggers, Her was Spike Jonze’s first solo screenplay and one which earned him his first Oscar success in 2014 for Best Original Screenplay. Her is certainly original in every sense and equally highly prescient in the overriding themes it tackles of an ever increasing technologically connected world but one in which human beings are more and more disconnected from ourselves, each other and of the day to day reality of the real world, and of our “marriage” to laptops, computers and smart phones that despite the great advantages these pieces of technology provide, also erect tangible barriers that these technological advances also create. But despite our, and the film’s, over dependency on the technology that surrounds and envelops us, Her has a real human story at it’s heart, two brilliant central performances set amid vivid and crystal clear cinematography from Director of Photography Hoyte Van Hoytema and a beautiful accompanying musical soundtrack from Canadian Indie rock band Arcade Fire.

The film is set in a near future world but rather than flying cars being the overall signifier of a said near future it is technologically driven and rather than today’s fast becoming obsolete practice of interacting with busy fingers on a laptop or smart phone screen, everything is voice activated with audio directly into the ears via a smart ear bud. Life in Her is seemingly familiar to today, however in Spike Jonze’s view of a near future many people have invested in a brand new, all purpose “O/S” or “Operating System” that they remain connected to throughout the day. Thus people of the near future seem to be constantly talking to themselves however they’re connected to, and interacting with, their O/S which, the developers are keen to reinforce in their advertisements, is “not just an Operating System, but a consciousness”. The O/S actively develops and evolves with human interaction and experience, quickly becoming more and more human like while blurring the lines between flesh and blood human beings and a complex computer operating system.

The above opening paragraphs are taken from my original spoiler free review of "Her" penned and published nearly a decade ago, transferred to my Medium blog site on 21st December 2022 and which can also be read in full and for free via my Substack blog site and the link immediately below:

https://ramblingmusings666.substack.com/p/her-2013-d061b1706e03

This spoiler free review is also integral to volume 3 of my 7 volumes of "essential film reviews collection". Only available currently in e-book form, each exhaustive volume of spoiler free film reviews is £4.99 however, should you have an Amazon Kindle "Unlimited" package, you can read each and every volume for free:

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https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0C4JTLRY1

7 Volume Collection

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0C4HZSTTH?binding=kindle_edition&ref=dbs_dp_rwt_sb_pc_tukn

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