Love Lost in the Marketplace: The Materialists
Expectations can become their own genre — one manufactured to convince you, before the lights dim, that what you’re about to watch will matter. The Materialists, produced by A24 and directed by Celine Song, arrived this past summer riddled with promise: a New York love story about desire in the age of ranking. The premise and cast is seductive — a matchmaker tackling love among the ultra-wealthy, where desire is like a contract. What appears onscreen, however, is far less alluring: a directionless film about love and desire that takes no risks.
Lucy (Dakota Johnson) is a professional matchmaker who treats relationships like a commodity. In early scenes, she interviews clients assessing their worth by income, height, and pedigree. The men who orbit her represent opposing ideals — an ex with theatrical goals (Chris Evans) and a billionaire who is too good to be true (Pedro Pascal). The triangle situates viewers in a conflict between passion and security, suggesting that modern love is a marketplace, one where romance is minimized into resumes of value. Lucy is caught between two men vying for her, yet she rarely roots for herself.
The execution of this trope is shallow, like much love these days. Scenes drift from classy restaurants to sleek offices, all with soft lighting. Lucy preaches about “worth,” and how people “match” one another, but the script never complicates these ideas beyond the obvious. Even the central love triangle lacks passion. Evans’ struggling career is given little to no backstory — we’re told he has dreams, but we don’t feel the weight of them. Pascal’s success, for all his sex appeal, is written from wounded wealth. Johnson, tasked with portraying Lucy’s conflict, seems caught between satire and sincerity, as even the film can’t decide what it wants.
Most troubling is a mid-film stalking subplot that turns the narrative into darker territory. The scenes serve as a warning label — a reminder that online dating is not all fun and games, but something that can turn violent. The threat appears, causes tension, and subsides with little acknowledgement, functioning less as commentary than as a spark to lead Lucy towards a romantic decision — as if trauma is just another market one can sell. Against a feminist culture keenly aware of how stalking and harassment shape women’s lives, these scenes become a plot accelerant instead of a critique on the dangers of online dating.
We’re living, undeniably, in an era where dating apps categorize attraction. Dating apps sort men into grids, creating spaces for how a “high-value man” can thrive online. The Materialists wish to diagnose this condition, to ask whether love can live in a world that is obsessed with superficiality. Yet it falls back on an overdone story — money isn’t important; listen to your heart. The critique becomes a cliché.
When the credits rolled, what lingered for this viewer wasn’t heartbreak but anger. The film is pristinely styled — tailored coats, spotless apartments — yet none of these details add to its emotional layering. It's a satire that never lands, a romance that rarely aches. For a movie about materialism, its truest irony is this: it looks expensive, but is hollow.
