Celine Song’s Materialists (2025) is a modern-day romantic comedy produced by A24, starring Dakota Johnson, Chris Evansand Pedro Pascal. Released in cinemas in June 2025, the film became one of the year’s highly anticipated movies after its glossy trailer premiere with Phlottila’s cover of Madonna’s Material Girl as a backdrop, with the hope of experiencing a conflicting love triangle. But underneath its glittering surface lies a deeper, sobering reflection on romance, quid pro quo relationships, and the loneliness offered by contemporary urban life. Similar to her feature debut, Past Lives, Song investigates how individual desire confronts societal norms, but this time through the workings of modern matchmaking.
The narrative revolves around Lucy (Dakota Johnson), a high-end professional matchmaker who sees marriage as a business deal between two people with something to offer. The film begins by establishing Song’s concept of the timelessness of love through the scene of a prehistoric couple where the man puts a flower ring on the finger of the woman he loves. The scene swiftly shifts to somewhere in downtown Manhattan, where Lucy engineers elite matches for her wealthy clients. What begins as professional soon bleeds into the personal, as she is pulled into the orbit of two men who stand at opposite ends of the spectrum – John (Chris Evans), her aspiring actor ex-boyfriend, and Harry (Pedro Pascal), a suave millionaire whose charm is tailored with precision as his suits. Lucy’s dilemma, whether to reinvite the chaos of her past or the comforts of a commodified tomorrow, serves as the backbone of the narrative.
On the surface, Materialists echoes the structure of a conventional love triangle. Still, it is transformed into an analogy for the modern-day dating scene through Song’s script, which is honed through her experience working at matchmaking service Tawkify. Through Lucy’s eyes, marriage is less about love and chemistry than about lifestyle, wealth, profession, education, age, and many other physical features, from height to hairline. The film’s incisive dialogue underscores how the new-age dating has become all about checklists and math, reflecting investment portfolios. Often, the dialogues are repetitive and try to lean towards sentimentality that is ultimately redirected to materialistic choices, signifying the title.
Similar to Past Lives, Song’s inclination towards subverting romantic comedies is visible in Materialists, where she places the film in the evolving trend of anti-romantic comedies, films that follow the aesthetics of rom-coms while subverting the conclusions that include a neat, happy ending to show the real pain and exhaustion that relationships offer. Song achieves much of this through extended conversations masked with wit and vulnerability that drive the film. Early sequences move quickly and are vividly constructed, with Lucy’s professional confidence concealing her underlying insecurities. But as the film progresses, the tone changes. The second half is considerably slower, leading to a feeling of unevenness and emotional fragmentation.
Dakota Johnson carries Lucy effortlessly at times, making her flawed, contradictory, sometimes off-putting, but always distinctly human. But her performance occasionally felt flat and underwhelming, making it difficult to fully connect with or yearn for the character emotionally. Stepping away from his superhero persona, Chris Evans imbues John with the fatigue and fragility of a broke man, though the character arc lacks depth. In contrast, Pedro Pascal fully inhabits Harry’s blend of charm and superficiality, even if the role sometimes leans towards exaggeration. Together, the trio tried to establish a compelling dynamic, though the male characters are only shown in relation to Lucy and not as fully fleshed individuals.
The film is visually appealing, with chic looks, sophisticated apartments and modern cafes, which makes the world of the characters appear glamorous yet somewhat detached from ordinary experience. New York City is presented as stylish and alienating, with soaring skyscrapers as metaphors for ambition and isolation. The conversations are presented with close-ups of characters, emphasising moments of hesitation and calculation, reinforcing the idea of love and relationships as a performance with high stakes.
Materialists is melancholic and serves as a critique of the commodification of contemporary relationships and the subtle encroachment of capitalism into our most intimate connections. Lucy’s profession embodies what most online dating apps suggest: compatibility can be algorithmically determined and romance treated as a transactional exchange. But at the end, the film suggests that love cannot be fully quantified and emotional complexity remains, even beneath the surface of imposed order.
Commercially, the film marked a success for A24, recording the studio’s third-largest opening weekend with around $12 million. This suggests that, though not universally loved; the film appealed to audiences weary of clichéd romances. The film is well-suited to audiences who want to engage with some deep questions and to contemplate the reality of modern romance.
Materialists avoids easy answers, leaving Lucy’s future ambiguous. Despite pacing flaws, unconvincing portrayals, and the underwritten male characters, it resonates as a thoughtful critique of love filtered through wealth, ambition and emotional contradictions. And in the end, Song reminds us that love is easier than ticking off lists and lucky are those who are content with it in this economy.
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