Materialists: Dakota Johnson, Chris Evans and Pedro Pascal fizzle in new rom-com

Herald Sun

18-06-2025

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Dakota Johnson, Chris Evans and Pedro Pascal make Materialists fabulous to look at – but the movie doesn't quite know what it wants to be.
Dakota Johnson and Pedro Pascal in the Materialists.
MATERIALISTS (M)
**1/2
General release.
Purely on the basis of the talent assembled, Materialists should have been a hit in every sense of the word.
First of all, you've got just about the best-looking love triangle possible: a radiant Dakota Johnson (as a fancypants New York professional matchmaker) pondering which of the duelling dreamboats Pedro Pascal (rich, tall and handsome) or Chris Evans (broke, tall and handsome) should ultimately prove worthy of her affections.
Secondly, behind the cameras, you have filmmaker Celine Song, who wowed audiences worldwide in 2023 with her multi-Oscar-nominated romantic drama Past Lives.
However, for a multitude of reasons, Materialists can only find fizzle where the sizzle should be. While hardly unwatchable, the movie seems perpetually unsure about what it wants to be.
Sometimes it is an undeniably likeable, if lightweight romantic comedy. At other times, it aspires to something heavier, as it explores the same storytelling planes traversed by Past Lives.
Most viewers will quickly pick up on Materialists' tentative tendencies, and become all the more frustrated with the obvious uncertainty on display.
Elio (voiced by Yonas Kibreab) and his alien buddy Glordon (voiced by Remy Edgerly) in Pixar's Elio.
ELIO (PG)
Directors: Madeline Sharafian, Domee Shi
Starring: the voices of Zoe Saldana, Yonas Kibreab, Brad Garrett, Shirley Henderson.
***1/2
Finding a better place in outer space
In recent times, younger audiences have been both underestimated and underserviced by the major movie studios.
However, the box-office figures of 2025 so far suggest the tide may finally be turning for the better. A majority of the biggest releases of the year have delivered the goods to kids in all the right ways.
If children weren't already spoiled for choice right now – as you read this, the top two movies worldwide are top-notch live-action remakes of Lilo & Stitch and How to Train Your Dragon – the welcome arrival of a quality new effort from Pixar Animation seals that deal emphatically.
This pleasingly imaginative combo of science fiction, light comedy and mild drama doesn't quite reach the lofty heights scaled by Pixar's best-known works. Nevertheless, its capacity to provoke real thought and genuine happiness should not be taken for granted.
As the story begins, Elio (voiced convincingly by newcomer Yonas Kibreab) is still getting over the recent passing of his parents.
This intelligent and sensitive 11-year-old is now in the care of his Aunt Olga (Zoe Saldana), an officer in the US Air Force Space Command tasked with mapping and tracking debris in deep space.
The around-the-clock pressures of her job have left Olga out of her depth when it comes to properly looking after Elio. The only thing that makes her space-obsessed nephew happy is when she brings him along to work.
It is during one of these visits that Elio learns of a possible attempt at radio communication from an alien presence several galaxies away from here.
Without Olga noticing, Elio figures out a way to respond to the message, and is instantly transported to a fascinating intergalactic realm known as the Communiverse.
The only way to describe the Communiverse is that it functions as a United Nations for the bulk of the known universe. Its colourful multitude of members are sufficiently impressed by Elio's arrival to assume he is a prominent leader back on Earth, and appoint him to be our planet's first representative at the Communiverse.
Understandably, Elio's sudden disappearance at home means that Olga must spearhead a search for her adventurous charge. Meanwhile, Elio finds himself a central figure in a Communiverse power struggle orchestrated by the warmongering Lord Grigon (Brad Garrett).
Intelligently scripted and playfully realised, Elio never fails to engage and entertain its target audience with ease. As usual, Pixar's animation team come into their own when illustrating the Communiverse and the vividly rendered alien beings that call it home.
Elio is in cinemas now.
Camile Rutherford in the French rom-com Jane Austen Wrecked My Life.
JANE AUSTEN WRECKED MY LIFE (M)
***1/2
Selected cinemas.
Charming and stylish, yet refreshingly unpretentious, this rom-com-ish affair from France is definitely worth checking out. Camile Rutherford stars in the lead role of Agathe, a woman in her early 30s caught in something of a rut, both professionally and personally.
Her job in a revered Parisian bookstore is a protective cocoon which in subtle ways has inhibited her ambitions as a writer, while also smothering her chances of forming a loving relationship.
Though a platonic bond with co-worker Felix (Pablo Pauly) does flicker with the potential for something deeper, it is his encouragement of Agathe's literary aspirations that sends the movie in an unexpected direction.
Once Agathe is accepted into a Jane Austen-themed writing workshop in England, she finds herself experiencing the same dilemmas, contradictions and opportunities for love that traditionally beset a typical Austen heroine.
A familiarity with Austen's books is hardly necessary to enjoy this sprightly, inventive and cannily observed tale, which highlights both its rookie writer-director Laura Piani and leading lady Rutherford as names to watch in the future.
Originally published as Dakota Johnson, Chris Evans and Pedro Pascal are the best-looking love triangle ever in Materialists