MARJORIE PRIME

RELEASED 3 NOVEMBER 12A | 99 minutes

Director michael almereyda Cast lois smith, Jon Hamm, Geena davis, tim robbins

If you could have a conversation with your deceased lover, would you want to? That question plays out literally in this soapy sci-fi, as the titular pensioner interacts with Walter, a holographic “Prime” version of her dead husband (Jon Hamm at his most coolly hermetic). A walking, talking replica that learns through its interactions, Walter at first appears to provide Marjorie (Lois Smith) with some comfort, but is this actually a case of grief, interrupted?

Based on Jordan Harrison’s stage play and largely sidestepping the potential horror of that scenario, Marjorie Prime asks big questions about memory, loss and love, but doesn’t ever attempt an answer. Smith, who played Marjorie twice on stage, is fantastic, and the film’s best moments come when she’s permitted to sit and reminisce with Walter. Their discussion of Julia Roberts’s ’90s romcom My Best Friend’s Wedding proves particularly poignant.

It’s frustrating, then, that the film’s exploration of technology and identity remains so opaque. Comparisons with Her are inevitable, but Marjorie Prime is restricted by its stage origins and diluted by an episodic plot that fails to say anything meaningful. Smith and Hamm are mesmerising but, by the muddled end, it turns out that conversations with dead people can be deathly dull. Josh Winning