Here’s an interesting premise, guy is lonely and reclusive, get’s a smartphone, smartphone is smart and can talk without that weird broken up phrasing that often plagues talking devices, romanticism blooms. For a movie about a lonely fellow the cast has a surprising amount of girl power and the kind that leaves near every heterosexual male hankering for the big screen.

Joaquin Phoenix plays the lead protagonist Theodore, a social recluse who finds friendship and romance with his smartphone’s AI-driven-voice-interface system (like Siri). It helps too that Scarlett Johansson lends her voice to the part and remember when I said this movie had girl power? Here’s the rest of the ladies:

Amy Adams
Rooney Mara
Olivia Wilde
Portia Doubleday
Katherine Boecher

I will admit that the first time I tried the Tap and Talk function on my Samsung Galaxy I thought, choosing a female voice helps me to feel endeared to it rather than just following orders, yes I want to ask you the weather again so you can tell me for the 7th time how nice and sunny it is tomorrow. The reason for most GPS units utilizing a female voice is exactly that, you want to listen to and follow the instructions of a female, guys we’re not wanted around the GPS command table. Even the US Airforce know this with their onboard computers warning pilots in a calm feminine voice -when you are losing altitude… or about to stall, it’s calming.

Her takes it a bit further by creating an AI that cares for Theodore, uses inflection and learns about him. This is ultimate techboy fantasy minus the latex. I think it’s quirky, funny and Scarlett has a great voice so on the “want to see” score it gets a solid 8/10. As a guide 10/10 would go to something like The Avengers when that came out, 1/10 would be, for me anyway, any of the <Insert adjective> Movie (i.e. Scary/Teen/Epic).

I can’t wait to see what Spike Jonze makes of this modern love story between man and silicone chips on a circuit board wrapped in some metal, plastic and glass. Maybe this tale is valid for our increasingly de-humanised world where contact comes from a screen and inputs on “Human Interface Devices” (or keyboard/mouse etc).

Check out the trailer and see (the future) for yourself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzV6mXIOVl4