Marjorie Prime review: Michael Almereyda brings his latest, a slightly sci-fi drama to the UK via the 2017 Sundance London film festival.
Marjorie Prime review by Paul Heath at the 2017 Sundance London film festival.
Marjorie Prime review
Marjorie Prime is an interesting, futuristic, very original sci-fi drama from American filmmaker Michael Almereyda (Experimenter, Hamlet) essentially set in one location – a coastal property, home to the Majorie (Lois Smith) of the title, a windowed 80-year-old woman living with her daughter Tess (Geena Davis) and son-in-law Jon (Tim Robbins). Jon has subscribed to a service which provides holograms of deceased relatives, and he has installed one such hologram of Marjorie’s former husband Walter – one which very much looks like Jon Hamm – at a time in his life when he was at his most handsome – and thus looks like Jon Hamm, complete with his stunning jawline and bone structure.
We’re not sure how much further into the future this is, but Tess and Jon use futuristic devices – phones now appear to be back-to-basics models made from plastic with simple digital displays, and he and wife Tess drink from weird looking mugs with an odd coloured liquid being contained by it. Besides that, and the lack of much clutter in the idealistic beach-fronted house, of which we are limited in what we can see past the living area, there’s not much indication that this is futuristic, and the film plays more like a theatrical production. Marjorie is seen interacting with Hamm’s version of her husband, the holograph feeding from previously installed information given from her relatives and from Marjorie herself as she battles a mixture of grief and crippling dementia.
Marjorie Prime review
In the wings is Geena Davis’ Tess, Marjorie’s daughter who refuses to accept the technology, as well as Tim Robbins’ slightly alcoholic funder who also spends copious amounts of time in front of his late father-in-law’s futuristic image.
Marjorie Prime sounds like something that Amazon may offer up on their highly trafficked shopping pages in the near future – customised delivered for personal use in less than 30 minutes after your loved one has popped their clogs in order to get over your grief. It’s a great concept, but one can’t quite help but feel that its slightly disappointingly executed.
There are some great ideas in there. I love the concept and there are tons of ways in which the film could have taken us, but what it does do is go the very predictable route and you can see its ending come a mile off (even its title is a slight spoiler).
Marjorie Prime review
In terms of the acting, Smith, who plays Marjorie, excels in the role and both she and Davis manage to bring some wonderful subtleties to their parts, as does Hamm as Walter Prime who manages to just about steer away from a conventional robotic performance but still manages to project that he is not human.
Almereyda’s film is a very, very slow-burner, all character driven and wonderfully played in terms of its acting, but its plodding pace makes this 98-minute drama feel much, much longer which is a great shame as I enjoyed inhabiting the world, but ultimately found myself pleading constantly for the film to take it all just that little bit further.
Marjorie Prime review by Paul Heath, June 2017.
Marjorie Prime is awaiting a UK release but screens as part of the 2017 Sundance London film festival.
