Not about Her at all - it is All About HIM and HIS (supposedly) Very Important Issues

Rating: 1/10 (31 May 2014)

Worry not. There isn't a plot in Her. So no plot spoiler possible. There isn't a story or dramatic plot movement (nor lower bowel movement). There isn't even a "HER"! Because? The far more interesting female characters were all under-utilized!
This is all about HIM! Oh the enticing spectacle of a desperate man seemingly conversing with his porn-voice invisi-bot....for nearly...2 hours.
By first act, the premise failed. By half point, the lead character failed, even Joaquin couldn't save it. The last one hour of the film should be watched like a tries-too-hard-to-be-taken-seriously, so-anal-it's-funny comedy with nice lighting, then you won't be angry you waste 2 hours of your life earnestly waiting for some important statement that never arrived.
Warning to genre fans or average thinking minds. This mediocre bore-fest is NOT a science fiction. Calling it a SF or speculative fiction is insulting to SF writers. Anyone who speaks more than their local version of English will know Scarlett Johansson's annoying contemporary speech with excessive panting and slang and hyper-contextual little giggles will NEVER be neutral or compressed enough to be used even as "stylized young American bimbo" speech bot. That blatant bad basic science alone killed it for me from the start. After that, it is just mindless gazing at the production styling and cinematography, because there's nothing else worth focusing on.
But some may STILL find the following exciting for all sorts of super-subjective reasons:
1. Joaquin Phoenix spotting 80's insurance salesman mustache
2. Men in the future wear high waist pants which make the beer-bellied ones look like cute giant tellytubbies
3. Future America looks like Shanghai meets Singapore outside, and Vancouver meets Ikea indoors
4. The writer reckons anal sex will (or should) achieve complete heterosexual normal. Scarlett Johansson also makes a sex act painful to at least 50% of the population sounds real fun and cutesy. Wow she must be SO relaxed and game for anything. More points to Scarlett among Hollywood elders and the anally-attracted.
Behind the anally color-coordinated furnishings, Scarlett's plastic-porn voice-over and careless unscientific techs, we are told to FOCUS ALL OUR ATTENTION at the loneliness of an average geek professional. We are supposed to care - even his "I refuse to accept real imperfect female half with her own needs and issues" dilemma is so mundane and common yesterday today and tomorrow that is just a giant yawn.
The ultimate message is a simple, cliché, BANAL one: All a man needs is a personal assistant cum psychotherapist cum nonjudgmental and always available instant orgasm stimulator. Too bad she doesn't even have a real body. Nothing the forearm and hand cannot take care of so what's the big deal. Amazing by 2030 we haven't invented a orgasm trigger implant or a all-catering fleshly domestic nurse-whore-maid android for such interaction-averse species. This movie is just one bad science after another that killed it for me over and over again.
But never-mind what a woman needs though. It doesn't deserve even 5 minutes of the whole movie. Apparently the bore-fest of a male lead character and his email-sorting and his moody ex-wife and his sexy-voice female bot with no depth and no face deserve urgent and undivided attention.
And that's why a bunch of men have written, produced, applauded, awarded this piece of mediocre bore-fest in the first place!
This movie is never about HER, but ALL ABOUT HIM, and HIS Very Anal fixations.