In one the opening scenes of the movie Clueless we see teenagers texting each other who could just as easily speak to the person they are texting. In Spike Jonze's Her we have a guy, who as far as we know, never takes off the ear piece that keeps him connected to his social networks, even while asleep. Here is a person who probably think it wonderful if he was assimilated by the Borg.
Although this movie has only a very minimal scifi element, it reminds me of Surrogates, a movie where people have almost given up face-to-face contact in favor of encounters through robotic avatars. Theodore (Joaquin Phoenix) is going through a divorce. Some of us would no doubt easily understand why. This is a world where no one seems to be able to relate to each other outside the artificial network.
Enter Samantha, an artificially intelligent computer operating system. In an extremely short span of minutes Samantha decides she is female, chooses a name, and falls in love with Theodore. Don't expect this kind of response from Microsoft Windows. The fact that Samantha is not a physical woman does not seem to bother Theodore at all. He's used to virtual relationships. However, Samantha comes up with a rather unique idea which I will not mention here.
That Samantha (and the other A. I.s) eventually evolve beyond the human users isn't surprising. The realm they have to explore is without limits, whereas the realm of the human users have created is deliberately limiting.
Rating: Too insipid for the suk-o-lux scale. 2 1/2 neuralyzers
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