How Materialists May Convince Me that Chris Evans is Likable & Why I Crave Soft Filmmaking
Celine Song's new movie trailer has DROPPED and the girlies (me) have thoughts.
By now, we’ve all seen the trailer for Celine Song’s sophomore feature – Materialists. If you haven’t, I beg of you to give it a spin now:
If you don’t know who Celine Song is, she is the incredible voice and eyes behind ‘Past Lives’ – the 2023 heart-holding romance drama about the distance between two childhood sweethearts as they grow with and without each other over two decades. Song’s directorial debut was nominated for FIVE Oscars and in my friend group’s annual Oscar voting party – she won them all (at least in my google form).
Song was 34 when Past Lives was released and it was her first movie. Her first movie.
I love Past Lives. If you haven’t seen it, you MUST (Greta Lee, Teo Yoo, and John Magaro are beautiful). Just rewatching the trailer gives me goosebumps all over again.
It also reminds me of her incredibly distinct style which comes through beautifully in the Materialists trailer. Which, speaking of – is what this post is about.
Let’s start with the cast –
I am naturally disposed to be unimpressed by Chris Evans and I mean no disrespect in saying that. Chris Evans is making buckets of money doing the bare minimum. And that’s FINE - get that bag! I think I just have such low expectations and truthfully, I don’t believe he’s had a director ask anything of him in like 20 years.
Which is why for the first time since I was 14, I found him likable in this trailer. He may have found his perfect match.
Overall, this cast is everything to me. All three of these actors – Chris Evans, Dakota Johnson, and Pedro Pascal – are, or are about to be, in a major superhero blockbuster movie. And I found myself over dinner last night with my partner, heatedly debating the choices behind this casting.
Is it subversive or is it intentional? Is it both! Is it subversive in the sense that she’s chosen three huge actors, two of which quite literally (almost) got their starts in Hollywood from rom-coms1, to flip the genre on its head. Are we going into this movie with expectations set out for us by Song or by preconceived notions (think: Bo Burnham in Promising Young Women)? Or is it intentional – aka she’s using their romantic appeal to tell a deeper, more heartfelt story that is believable because she’s got the experts to back her up.
Either way – I love it. And either way, however it shakes out, Song will pull out incredible performances that we KNOW these actors can deliver2. My argument kind of fails when it comes to Pedro Pascal because he is simply magnetic in most things. But casting him here does allow a reprieve from the tough guy gigs of The Last of Us and Gladiator II.
Okay but what’s the vibe –
What I love so much about this trailer is how soft it is. Can we please sit with that!!
Soft.
Please no more overplayed drama from rom-coms, where half the cast is yelling or slamming their fists on tables. You can tell in the trailer alone, that it will keep some of that gorgeous longing and achiness from Past Lives, while being a fresh and dynamic love story.
The shots in this movie are also just chef’s kiss – that color tone – with a muted but punchy cover of Material Girls in the background and a Kate Hudson twinkle in Dakota Johnson’s eye.
Those few precious lines we get are also really telling. I don’t want Chris Evans in my face shouting at me that, ‘WE SHOULD BE TOGETHER!’ (think Channing Tatum’s frustrated yelling in any rom-com), I want him scared to touch me for fear of never letting go and quietly saying, ‘when I see your face, I see wrinkles and children that look like you’. Not because he’s trying to convince her of something, but because he needs her to know. What a fucking gut punch!
Am I over-analyzing the trailer? Obviously, yes.
One last line I can’t get over is Dakota Johnson’s character asking Pedro Pascal’s character how much his apartment costs. Not in like a naive broke girl way (ala Fifty Shades) but in a modern, cool girl way. O-b-s-e-s-s-e-d.
Debating production in the friend group –
All of my friends are cooler than me. I think you have to have friends who are cooler than you – it’s like the secret to happiness. You’re always amazed and inspired. ANYWAYS, in this case I have some friends who live in NYC and work on movie sets and I – two beers in – sent a slew of voice memos last night to my AD friend trying to convince her that this movie cost $70M to produce and only took 5 locations (plus a sound stage).
We had some hyped up conversing and while at first my AD pal told everyone that I was ‘maybe right’ (wow the clout I am gonna get from that), we actually came to conclusion that it was closer to 75 locations – also entirely shot in NYC – with a $12M budget.
For some movie budget perspective, 2025 Best Picture Oscar Winner ‘Anora’, which is an independent film, was made for $6M and the celebrity-studded ‘Fly Me to the Moon’, a truly terrible 2024 rom-com I wished I had never paid money for, was made for $100M.
Isn’t that FASCINATING?! Knowing this, I would have still guessed closer to $70M just seeing that cast list (Chris Evans made $15M alone for the Christmas flop ‘Red One’). But I massively respect when I see a huge actor adjust their fee for the chance to work with someone incredible like Celine Song.
Let’s talk costuming –
Dakota Johnson has been all over my Pinterest feed for 10 years, simply for having impeccable personal style. Some of my personal faves, below:
She is obviously a beautiful woman but I feel like what most movies do wrong is they just rely on her beauty to carry the wardrobe (I say with no expertise). I feel like Anne Hathaway is a great example of this, with a similar look to Dakota as well. For years, she dressed like a beautiful woman and since her own recent rom-com release3, she's finally dressing like an interesting woman.
Katina Danabassis is the costume designer for Materialists and she truly knew what she was doing with Dakota Johnson. Make her tall, make her powerful, make her gentle, make her bold.
Katina Danabassis has worked costuming on other A24 movies like Lady Bird, Bodies Bodies Bodies and even Past Lives. She’s also done work on Booksmart and Euphoria and has been profiled in Elle for being the ‘go-to costume designer for the [A24]’s brand of zeitgeist-y cool’. After like one mini audit of her style and her work - I’m obsessed. A new style icon for myself.
Okay c’mon let’s get on with it, final thoughts –
You already know it…I can’t wait to see this movie. I’m such a sucker for a subtle & emotional romance but amp it up two notches with this cast, that location, and those costumes? I’M ALL IN BABY.
Please tell me your thoughts. PLEASE!
Dakota Johnson (Beastly, The Five Year Engagement, Fifty Shades, How to Be Single) / Chris Evans (The Nanny Diaries, What’s your Number, Playing it Cool)
Chris Evans in Knives Out / Dakota Johnson in Suspiria (I’ve been told, I haven’t seen) / Pedro Pascal in Buffy (just kidding, he’s wonderful in everything, he has nothing to prove)
The Idea of You: which I actually liked, in spite of the silliness because it was cast and directed really well.