marjorie prime
marjorie prime will be available on amazon prime video this year as part of amazon video direct’s film festival stars program .
‘marjorie prime’ review: an intelligent but airless a. i. drama – variety
‘marjorie prime’ arrives with awards hopes – specialty b. o. preview | deadline
watch the official trailer for jordan harrison' s pulitzer prize finalist ‘marjorie prime. ’
jon hamm is eternally young, smart and attractive in the trailer for “ marjorie prime. ”
tim robbins is joining the marjorie prime, the sci - fi dramedy that will star jon hamm .
‘marjorie prime’ arrives with awards hopes; ‘patti cake $ ’ bows – specialty b. o. preview
looking for movie tickets? enter your location to see which movie theaters are playing marjorie prime near you .
“marjorie prime” premiered in the premieres section at the 2017 sundance film festival. it is currently seeking distribution .
fortitude international is handling sales on marjorie prime and will be showing footage to buyers at the european film market .
the play marjorie prime had its world premiere at the center theatre group / mark taper forum in los angeles in september 2014. veteran actor smith starred in the playwrights horizons staging of marjorie prime in new york in december 2015 .
marjorie - 85. walter - early 30s. tess - 55. marjorie' s daughter. jon - 55. marjorie' s son - in - law .
directed by kimberly senior in the bookstore venue, marjorie prime will take audiences on a twisting journey into uncharted theatrical terrain .
jon hamm and tim robbins are in a familial face - off in the hollywood reporter' s first look at marjorie prime .
+ the cast of marjorie prime discusses their experiences in rehearsing the play. video by luke millett. (2: 53 )
harrison’s play was concerned with the limits and abilities of technology, but almereyda seems much more preoccupied with the notions and possibilities of storytelling. early in “marjorie prime, ” walter prime tells marjorie a story about a memorable night out at the movies when they were much younger, and while both marjorie and the audience must take the story at face value, marjorie throws in an alteration that will appear the next time walter prime tells the story. it’s not true, but it doesn’t matter; it’s the feeling that does, and “marjorie prime” feels less true at every turn .
the haunting and allusive marjorie prime is a sci - fi film set in the near future but its emotional resonance is bracingly immediate .
marjorie prime opens on 18 august in new york city with a nationwide expansion to follow. a uk date is yet to be announced
+ director kimberly senior discusses her upcoming production of marjorie prime at writers theatre. video by luke millett. (2: 25 )
jordan harrison lets us in on two of his sources of inspiration for his pulitzer prize finalist ‘marjorie prime’‬: a chatbot and his grandmother .
marjorie prime premiered at the mark taper forum / center theater group in los angeles in september 2014. the production was directed by les waters .
explore popular and recently added tv series available to stream now with prime video .
marjorie prime is adapted from stage to screen with such a lack of creativity, ingenuity, or re - imagination that i' m almost offended .
‘there are scenes of remarkable insight for those willing to look past the unashamed staginess’... jon hamm in marjorie prime. photograph: jason robinette / ap
uri singer produced michael almereyda’s 2015 film experimenter. while screening the title at the beijing film festival, almereyda told singer he had seen the play marjorie prime .
lisa emery, left, as tess, lois smith as marjorie and frank wood as jon in the world premiere of
marjorie prime
at the mark taper forum in los angeles. (lawrence k. ho / los angeles times )
featuring performances from the cast interspersed between an eye - opening conversation between playwright jordan harrison, director anne kauffman, and author brian christian, whose book inspired ‘marjorie prime. ’
smith: (as marjorie) it means i haven' t been eating .
i expected marjorie prime to present me with some sort of philosophical quandary, however, i expected that quandary to relate to the standard robot stuff: identity, humanity, what it means to be alive, that old chestnut. instead, marjorie prime philosophises about memory, and beyond that, truth. still doesn' t stop it from being pretty crap though .
marjorie prime …is primarily concerned with something eternal: the way our humanity is shaped and warped by the mysterious ebbs and flows of memory .
- los angeles times, read more
hamm: (as walter) of course. marjorie, where are the dishes ?
hamm: (as walter) marjorie, we both know what no dishes means .
marjorie and walter’s grown daughter, tess (davis), isn’t a fan of walter prime; marjorie is much nicer to him than she is to her own child. even so, tess recognizes the comfort and stimulation he provides to her. meanwhile, tess’ husband, jon, is secretly feeding memories to walter prime, a move that initially seems kind and eventually turns needlessly cruel. as “marjorie prime” continues (and other primes stop by), that becomes the film’s primary problem: performances are solid, but characters are so thinly written that they prove impossible to know .
but although marjorie prime hints at deep themes, it doesn’t always give them the emotional weight they deserve. the phenomenal black mirror episode “san junipero” explored similar ideas of aging, romance, and living on after death through virtual reality, and marjorie prime feels like it never quite reaches the same heights. marjorie’s family spends so much of their time sitting around talking about their lives instead of living them that it’s hard for the audience to ever emotionally connect with any of them .
the virtues in marjorie prime are modest, but the muted cinematography by sean price williams adds enormously to the blurred vision of reality the characters feel throughout, and the cast is first - rate .
this startling and profound new drama – a realistic work, and a brilliant one at that – is devastatingly rendered by the superior ensemble under anne kauffman’s beautifully balanced direction. see marjorie prime now .
lois smith: (as marjorie) i feel like i have to perform around you .
filmrise picked up the title in march. the distributor will open marjorie prime in one theater each in new york, los angeles and san francisco this weekend, followed by a national roll - out .
in marjorie prime, the holograms (usually of the deceased) are meant to provide comfort, although they sometimes act as caretakers. for example, walter prime obligingly tells marjorie stories of how he wooed her and when he proposed, based on the tales she had told him in the past. it' s an unconventional form of therapy, but the act of talking to a loved one without fear of judgment can be just as cathartic as traditional counseling. walter prime also reminds marjorie to eat, calmly questioning the excuses she comes up with to avoid doing so. by contrast, marjorie' s human caretaker, julie, sneaks the ailing woman cigarettes when tess and jon aren' t around .
here' s how it works. the prime begins as more or less a blank slate. but by the time, we meet walter prime, he' s absorbed the key information about marjorie' s life. he can reminisce, share stories and respond to questions. since marjorie has growing dementia, walter prime might soon, quote ,
remember more of her life than she does .
the 86 - year - old lois smith has a brightness, a girlishness that makes her loss of memory seem even more poignant .
we are only human, and our recollections are imperfect. so when we try to create an account of our past, can we trust ourselves? that' s the question at the heart of the new film marjorie prime, which opens today in 15 cities (with a national rollout to eventually follow). it is a quiet, contemplative drama that studies our fear of technology and mortality by juxtaposing people with computerized versions of themselves. thanks to convincing performances by jon hamm (walter prime), lois smith (marjorie / marjorie prime) and geena davis (tess / tess prime), the movie forces us to consider if we' re to blame for all the times ai goes awry. it also questions whether we' re entrusting technology with too much responsibility .
“marjorie prime” is so beautifully and consistently focused on the human that i wanted to introduce marjorie and walter as people with a rich and complex relationship. but walter, in addition to being a very charming and well - spoken guy, is also a hologram. he is, in fact, a “prime”—a hologram created to technologically reincarnate a dead person for therapeutic purposes (the real walter died 15 years before). walter prime provides comfort to marjorie by helping her recall her past as age slowly eats away at her memory. but their conversations also benefit him, so to speak, since his knowledge of her history must be supplied and augmented by others, including her .
set in the near future, marjorie prime centers on smith’s marjorie, who spends time with the young likeness of her deceased husband walter (hamm). this revitalized walter is a sophisticated holographic projection that provides companionship while stimulating marjorie’s memory—allowing her to explore their shared past as she lives with dementia. marjorie’s daughter tess (davis) and her husband jon (robbins) develop their own complex feelings about the new walter, uneasily coming to terms with the nature of identity, memory, and our ever - shifting relationship to technology .
david edelstein, byline: there are four main characters in the haunting sci - fi chamber drama
marjorie prime ,
some of them computer - generated holograms of the dead. a better title would be
ghost sonata ,
but strindberg already used it. it opens with a gentle conversation between lois smith' s 85 - year - old marjorie and jon hamm as her husband walter, who died 15 years earlier. the holograms are called primes. and marjorie' s daughter and son - in - law have bought her one. walter prime looks so young, like jon hamm, because marjorie asked for one at the age he was when they were married .
if you are feeling especially dumb, or hungover, steer clear of “marjorie prime. ” michael almereyda’s film is so subtly smart, and veiled in such layers of suggestion, that you need to be on your toes from the beginning .
marjorie prime is set to bow on a limited number of screens in new york and los angeles on aug. 18, with a national rollout planned for subsequent weeks. watch ew’s exclusive trailer above, and check out the film’s poster below .
this is fresh air. the new film
marjorie prime
is set in the near future in a world where people can purchase holographic versions of their dead loved ones. the movie, directed by michael almereyda, stars lois smith, geena davis, tim robbins and jon hamm as the first hologram - or prime - that we meet. film critic david edelstein has this review .
marjorie prime has an intriguing premise and an interesting creative team behind it. the director is michael almereyda, perhaps most famous for his 2000 version of hamlet, which had ethan hawke delivering “to be or not to be” in a blockbuster video store. the cast of marjorie prime includes lois smith, tim robbins, jon hamm, and geena davis, with hamm playing a hologram of a younger version of robbins’s father - in - law. so, sounds wacky and very sundance. could be something !
jon hamm is eternally young, smart and attractive in the trailer for “marjorie prime. ” in the movie he portrays a computerized version of the deceased husband of lois smith’ titular 86 - year - old marjorie. “i’ll be right here — i have all the time in the world, ” he assures her in the trailer, released wednesday by distributor [ … ]
directed by michael almereyda, marjorie prime is adapted from jordan harrison’s 2014 pulitzer prize - nominated stage play of the same name, which saw smith originating the same role she plays in the film. smith says she fell in love with marjorie after the script was first brought to her some years ago, partly because she identifies with a number of the character’s struggles .
that in itself is unexpected coming from a director whose films have at times been somewhat chilly and cerebral. but even at its most sorrowful, marjorie prime is suffused with warmth, the core of it emanating from smith in two complementary iterations of the same character .
marjorie prime
is not the kind of movie in which we learn the background of prime technology, who invented it and so on. it' s sci - fi as a means of exploring our inner lives, the way charlie kaufman and michel gondry do in
eternal sunshine of the spotless mind .
john hamm' s face as the holographic walter prime is not flat or neutral but radiantly not judgmental, even beatific, even beautiful. the movie is suffused with despair but also an abiding sense of forgiveness. it' s transcendentally woebegone .
marjorie prime may be a sci - fi movie, but there are no flying cars, aliens, or far - flung solar systems. most of the action takes place in a single beach house, where almost every scene consists of two people talking. the plot hinges on a distinctly sci - fi concept — deceased loved ones can be resurrected in the form of a “prime, ” a hologram designed to absorb information and hold conversations about the past — but writer - director michael almereyda (experimenter) isn’t interested in exploring the mechanics of artificial intelligence. instead, marjorie prime is a quiet, contemplative family drama about memory. and about how those memories shape who we are .
“i’m pleased that the wave of good feeling generated by our sundance screenings has been caught by filmrise, and i look forward to working with them on marjorie ’s american release. ” added singer: “i’m very enthusiastic to be working with filmrise on the american release of marjorie prime. after a successful premiere at sundance, i’m excited that the film is in good hands and will reach a wide audience. ”
smith: (as marjorie) i' m not hungry. it' s their fault, feeding me all those pills .
in the movie he portrays a computerized version of the deceased husband of lois smith ’ titular 86 - year - old marjorie .
in this film, smith plays marjorie, who spends her final, ailing days with a computerized version of her deceased husband. with the intent to recount their life together, marjorie’s “prime” relies on the information from her and her kin to develop a more complex understanding of his history. as their interactions deepen, the family begins to develop ever diverging accounts of their lives, drawn into reconstructing the often painful past .
marjorie, 86, is dying. in her final months, she finds solace in an artificially intelligent holographic re - creation of her late husband, walter, called
walter prime .
they talk every day, recounting special moments of their life together. but her memory isn' t perfect, and walter prime can rely only on retellings to piece together what happened. he also talks to other people, including marjorie' s daughter tess and son - in - law jon, who move in to take care of her. from all of his exchanges, walter prime gathers various bits of information on how to play his part, and pieces together a history shared among all the characters, which he refers to in his conversations .
smith: (as marjorie) maybe it' s not bad if i feel that way. i used to entertain a lot .
the film’s story has two other main characters. marjorie shares the beach house with her daughter tess (geena davis) and son - in - law jon (tim robbins). tess is troubled by various things in her past and present, including walter prime. it just doesn’t feel right to have this image of her dad as a young man having chats with her mom in the living room. jon, though, is an enthusiastic supporter of the new technology; he thinks walter prime is good for marjorie and is happy to share his memories of the family to help out .
haunting' marjorie prime' is suffused with forgiveness and despair the new film is set in the near future, when people can purchase holographic versions of their dead loved ones. this drama isn' t about technology — it' s sci - fi as a means of exploring our inner lives .
eighty - six - year - old marjorie spends her final, ailing days with a computerized version of her deceased husband. with the intent to recount their life together, marjorie' s prime relies on the information from her and her kin to develop a more complex understanding of his history. as their interactions deepen, the family begins to develop diverging recounts of their lives, drawn into the chance to reconstruct the often painful past .
i’ve known almereyda for many years and have struggled to come to terms with his work for nearly as long. made on tiny budgets, his films are dense with detail and can seem a tad overintellectualized. but in his last few films — experimenter, the current documentary escapes, and now marjorie prime — his formal devices bring us closer to his subjects instead of distancing us. the world of marjorie prime is alive with reflections and refractions, with imperfect copies of people who could be seen — as a result of their selective memories — as imperfect copies of themselves. it’s a transcendently lovely work — a ghost sonata .
marjorie’s “prime” relies on the information from herself and others to develop a more complex understanding of his history. so as their interactions deepen, the family begins to develop diverging accounts of what has transpired in their lives. geena davis stars as the daughter of smith’s character and tim robbins portrays the son in law .
marjorie prime will receive a $ 20, 000 cash award from the alfred p. sloan foundation. the prize is selected by a jury of film and science professionals and “presented to outstanding feature films focusing on science or technology as a theme, or depicting a scientist, engineer or mathematician as a major character. ”
i have the same reluctance to talk about the role artificial intelligence plays in marjorie prime as i had to discuss the nuclear meltdown setting of anne washburn’s acclaimed mr. burns. in some respects, both plays feel as if they were written in response to our pop culture’s unslakeable appetite for certain sensationalistic science fiction tropes .
marjorie prime / u. s. a. (director and screenwriter: michael almereyda) — in the near future—a time of artificial intelligence—86 - year - old marjorie has a handsome new companion who looks like her deceased husband and is programmed to feed the story of her life back to her. what would we remember, and what would we forget, if given the chance? cast: jon hamm, geena davis, lois smith, tim robbins. world premiere
jordan harrison was a 2015 pulitzer prize finalist for marjorie prime. the play had its new york premiere at playwrights horizons and its chicago premiere at writers theatre after premiering at the mark taper forum / ctg in los angeles. his play maple and vine premiered in the 2011 humana festival at actors theatre of lo ...
in the near future, a time of artificial intelligence: 86 - year - old marjorie – a jumble of disparate, fading memories - - has a handsome new companion who looks like her deceased husband and is programmed to feed the story of her life back to her. what would we remember, and what would we forget, if given the chance? marjorie prime is based on jordan harrison’s pulitzer - nominated play, exploring memory and identity, love and loss .
marjorie is the fulcrum of marjorie prime but not its dramatic center. she has more than a touch of dementia. she’s on her way out. it’s her daughter, tess (geena davis), who feels the instability of the world most acutely, and tess’s husband, jon (tim robbins), who feels the instability of tess. a dead child figures in the plot, as a dead child figures in so many — probably too many — plots, but here the child is used to mysterious and tantalizing effect. he was tess’s older brother, and marjorie has almost expunged his memory. he’s absent from the stories she tells walter prime. the question is whether the boy can be written out of the past altogether or whether the fact of him will be signaled by the hole where he should be .
rather than gizmos or hypothetical futures, almereyda is interested in philosophical issues concerning memory and identity. adapted from the acclaimed 2014 play by jordan harrison, “marjorie prime” has a gentle, probing chekhovian feel, and a deliberate dramatic approach that invites us to look at those aforementioned issues from various angles before coming to our own conclusions about them .
marjorie prime
is a smart new play that doesn' t always feel particularly welcoming. harrison, a writer on the netflix original series
orange is the new black ,
doesn' t exactly specialize in ingratiating characters. marjorie and tess at times put me in mind of bruce norris' contentious crew, and like much of norris' work, there' s an abstract quality to harrison' s writing here that stems from ideas being more highly valued than their personal embodiment .
beginning with the first scene’s revelation of walter’s nature as a hologram, “marjorie prime” contains a steadily accumulating stream of ingenious plot twists, sometimes very subtle or subtly revealed. to discuss these would be to venture into spoiler territory, so suffice it to say that almereyda’s script is very sharp and especially good at delineating the film’s four main characters .
does every good play benefit from becoming a movie? in the sense that it brings a broader audience to a hitherto limited - access entertainment, of course. but the camera can have a diminishing effect on some highly expansive stage works — and so it proves in “marjorie prime, ” a sporadically fascinating but airless adaptation of jordan [ … ]
eighty - six - year - old marjorie spends her final, ailing days with a computerized version of her deceased husband. with the intent to recount their life together, marjorie' s
prime
relies on the information from her and her kin to develop a more complex understanding of his history. as their interactions deepen, the family begins to develop ever diverging recounts of their lives, drawn into the chance to reconstruct the often painful past. built around exceptional performances from a veteran cast, marjorie prime shines a light on an often - obscured corner in the world of artificial intelligence and its interactions with mortality. bringing us robustly into the future, michael almaryeda' s poetic film forces us to face the question - if we had the opportunity, how would we choose to rebuild the past, and what would we decide to forget ?
lois smith stars as the titular marjorie, reprising her role from jordan harrison’s 2014 pulitzer prize - nominated stage play. marjorie is an 86 - year - old widower, and with both her health and her memory fading, she starts to rely on a hologram version of her husband, walter (jon hamm) — who’s been dead for about 15 years. with guidance from marjorie’s adult daughter tess (geena davis) and son - in - law jon (tim robbins), walter listens, learns, and eventually holds entire conversations with marjorie, reminiscing about a past she doesn’t remember and that he wasn’t even there for .
in his new play ,
marjorie prime ,
which is having its world premiere at the mark taper forum in a production directed by les waters, jordan harrison explores the fraught subject of memory from a variety of fascinating angles, including senior dementia, our ever - increasing dependence on technology and that old freudian standby, the perils of repression .
writer / director michael almereyda (who also wrote the screenplay for the kitschy yet daring 1987 film cherry 2000, set in a world where men marry sexually compliant androids) has created a worthy addition to this soulful subgenre in a big - screen adaptation of jordan harrison’s pulitzer prize - nominated play marjorie prime. he’s smartly retained the off - broadway casting of lois smith, the 86 - year - old industry veteran who plays marjorie with such soft ease that it’s impossible to imagine anyone else in the role .
tess (lisa emery), marjorie' s frosty daughter always spoiling for a fight, is suspicious. but jon (frank wood), tess' husband, is enthusiastically on board, offering background information about his mother - in - law' s salty past to enhance the
prime' s
conversational acumen. conflict between the caretakers ensues .
having spent over 60 years appearing on screens big and small, lois smith’s roots as a performer extend deep into hollywood’s past, but her latest film, sundance award - winner marjorie prime, is a black mirror - esque, sci - fi - tinged peek into the future, where technological advances have allowed humans to reconnect with computerized versions of their departed loved ones .
the sci - fi chamber drama marjorie prime is exquisite — beautiful, intense, shivering with empathy. it opens with a gentle, affectionate conversation between the ailing 86 - year - old marjorie (lois smith) and her husband, walter (jon hamm), who died 15 years earlier — presumably looking much older than the dark, slender man who represents the walter whom marjorie first met. this walter is not marjorie’s fantasy but a hologram — a “prime” — that begins as a blank slate but gradually absorbs information to the point where it can reminisce, share stories, and respond to questions — eventually “remembering” more than humans, whose memories are malleable and transient. primes seem to have been invented to give comfort to the bereaved, the old, the lonely — to function as virtual - reality opiates. but they’re so open, shiny - eyed, and nonjudgmental that people want to say everything to them. they want to say what they couldn’t say to those who can no longer hear them. this isn’t escapism. it’s an intensification of the past, both longed for and hellish .
memory is an essential element of life – crucial to thought, feeling, progress, identity. but it also comes into play with particular power and meaning after someone who has been loved dies. and it is this tension between life and death – with memory functioning as connective tissue – that animates jordan harrison’s subtly shattering play, marjorie prime .
- chicago sun - times, read more
walter (jeff ward) is a computer - programmed, pixel - generated companion brought in to keep marjorie' s mind from atrophying further. shady lane, the assisted - living facility in which marjorie has a cookie - cutter apartment (austerely decorated by set designer mimi lien in various shades of soul - erasing beige), has recommended this form of therapy .
much like harrison' s
maple and vine ,
a play about a community pretending to live in the 1950s to escape the technologically dizzying rat race ,
marjorie prime
has an audacious concept that isn' t easy to dramatically sustain. this is the kind of work that would probably benefit from a more intimate space, though the taper has gathered a first - rate cast under waters' expert direction .
still, all four lead actors breathe life into characters who, on their own, would fall flat. smith’s marjorie is regretful, hopeful, loving, and disoriented, often all at once, and hamm is fantastic as the holographic walter, adjusting his performance subtly so he appears sometimes devastatingly human and sometimes unsettlingly robotic. (hamm’s mechanical movements bring to mind michael fassbender’s dual android roles in this year’s alien: covenant — and not just because one of fassbender’s characters is also named walter .) marjorie prime in itself feels not unlike walter’s hologram — almost real and almost human, but not quite flesh and blood. b -
while marjorie is the most solid construction (and one smith knows well, drawing out all of her shades with staggering skill), jon and tess are so foreign to the audience that even robbins and davis can’t quite crack them. major plot points are baffling, if only because the characters remain so vague to us. prime performances are purposely low key, but hamm still breathes life into a role who’s literally made out of air .
the film challenges our mistrust of ai and technology, showing that if anything is untrustworthy, it' s our own memories. we are the ones who contaminate software with our own biases. we don' t need marjorie prime to show us that - - our own world today is full of examples: microsoft' s ai chatbot tay, who was turned racist by twitter users, and the company' s subsequent bot zo, who met the same fate. some believe that in the us justice system, the use of algorithms that predict a person' s potential for recidivism as a way to determine punishment is inherently biased. ai is a man - made product, and its flaws are created by us. it is also our fault when we entrust the technology with responsibilities, like making them our therapists, as the characters in marjorie prime have done, however unwittingly .
michael almereyda’s marjorie prime, the film adaptation of the pulitzer prize finalist play by jordan harrison, won the feature film prize. other winners included adam benic’s levittown (sundance institute | alfred p. sloan foundation episodic storytelling grant); darcy brislin and dyana winkler’s bell (sundance institute | sloan lab fellowship); and jamie dawson, howard gertler, and likely story' s untitled smallpox eradication project (sundance institute | sloan commissioning grant) .
set in the near - ish future, michael almereyda’s sci - fi pic marjorie prime is based on jordan harrison’s pulitzer - nominated play exploring memory, identity, love and loss. the film, which won the sundance film festival’s alfred p. sloan foundation feature film prize, will bring an awards push for the title star, the 86 - year - old lois smith, who starred in elia kazan’s east of eden opposite james dean in 1955 .
if the work is ultimately more conceptually intriguing than dramatically satisfying, it' s the kind of experience that keeps unfolding in the mind long after the 80 - minute play is over. and for all its fancy, futuristic invention ,
marjorie prime ,
which also grapples with the hidden legacy of suicide in a family, is primarily concerned with something eternal: the way our humanity is shaped and warped by the mysterious ebbs and flows of memory .
“ marjorie prime, ” directed by michael almereyda and based on jordan harrison’s play of the same name, debuted in january at the sundance film festival. the film won the sloan feature film prize, which includes a $ 20, 000 cash award. the award jury cited its “imaginative and nuanced depiction of the evolving relationship between humans and technology, and its moving dramatization of how intelligent machines can challenge our notions of identity, memory and mortality. ”
his 2001
hamlet
with ethan hawke and kyle maclachlin is a truly cinematic rethinking of that masterpiece. his documentaries
this so - called disaster
about sam shepard and
william eggleston in the real world
are revelatory. last year' s
experimenter ,
a fictionalized treatment of the life of yale social scientist stanley milgram, was playful in form but had real moral urgency .
marjorie prime
might be my favorite of his films .
there’s very little in marjorie prime that explains how the holo - technology works; tim robbins’s character admits at one point that he hasn’t read the brochure. but even this works as part of the story. miraculous inventions have become part of our lives, and have certainly changed us, just as much as people have. the transference of emotion from the real to the programmable—a sort of technology most of us hardly understand—may not be so far off after all .
the first scene of michael almereyda ’s graceful, enthralling chamber drama “marjorie prime” takes place in the well - appointed living room of a long island beach house. the sounds of waves outside are heard throughout. a woman in her mid - 80s and a handsome man who appears to be in his 40s sit across a table and talk for a good while. if you came in not knowing the film was adapted from a play, you might guess it here .
the questions of trusting ai and contrasting humans with machines have already been heavily explored (think: her or the episode
be right back
in black mirror), but marjorie prime delves deeper into how human nature is to blame. yet it withholds judgement and shows how we can' t help our failings, especially as we age. the beauty of humanity often lies in its flaws, and it' s something ai can imitate but not fully replicate .
exclusive: filmrise has acquired u. s. distribution rights to marjorie prime, the michael almereyda sci - fi pic starring lois smith and jon hamm. it bowed this year at sundance, where it won the festival’s alfred p. sloan foundation feature film prize. filmrise plans a mid - 2017 theatrical release and an awards - season push for its 86 - year - old star smith, whose credits go as far back as elia kazan’s 1955 classic east of eden .
edelstein: director michael almereyda adapted
marjorie prime
from a play by jordan harrison, much of it a series of conversations between family members and the primes who eventually take their places, all set in a beach house in the near future. at the movie' s heart is a paradox that' s rather stunning. primes seem to have been invented to give comfort and companionship to the bereaved. but the bereaved don' t use them just as vehicles for lovely pipe dreams. they end up saying things to primes that they couldn' t say to the people on whom the primes were modeled. jon hamm looks so trim and open and receptive that the awkwardness between him and marjorie fades .
such moments are quietly affecting. there' s tenderness also in walter' s gentle reassurance that while marjorie' s accomplishments as a violinist are no longer within the capabilities of her arthritic hands, the sense memory remains .
tess, a prickly type whose difficult relationship with her mother is mirrored in tension with her own unseen daughter, is skeptical of the benefits of the prime, and a little jealous of marjorie' s fondness for him. but jon participates with great care in walter' s
education ,
embellishing details of his mother - in - law' s romance with a tennis player before her marriage, and even filling in gaps about a family tragedy during a drunken chat. that sheds new light for walter on marjorie' s recollection of a long - ago trip to new york with her husband, during which she was enchanted by the billowing saffron banners of christo' s
the gates
in central park .
“i’ve been acting for many decades now, i’ve had deeply interesting roles to play both on stage and screen, this one is particularly precious i suppose, because it’s complicated, it’s lively, ” smith, whose first film appearance was a supporting role alongside james dean in 1952’s east of eden, tells ew of marjorie prime. “the beauty of it, to me is its humanism and seeing how it connects how we live and explore connections with each other, our family, and memory. ”
in a beautiful house by the sea, an elderly woman, marjorie (lois smith), talks to a more youthful man, named walter (jon hamm). he sits erect on the couch, unflappable and neatly groomed, like don draper crossed with a robot; there’s something not quite right about him, and it’s only at the end of the scene that the something becomes clear. as marjorie brushes past him, she walks through his shoes as if they weren’t there at all. and they’re not. walter is a prime—a computer program, providing a 3 - d facsimile of a deceased person. in this case, the true walter was marjorie’s late husband, and she has chosen to have him return as an earlier self, thus setting an immediate moral test: if you could summon up those you have loved and lost, at what stage would you capture them? in their heyday? or as they were in yours ?
it' s the age of artificial intelligence, but 86 - year - old marjorie is worried that her memory may be fading. that is until the appearance of walter, a mysterious and charming young visitor programmed to help marjorie uncover the intricacies of her own past. as walter' s true nature is revealed, new levels of complexity emerge, leading to profound questions about the limits of technology and whether memory might be a purely human invention .
awkward pacing and questionable narrative choices pepper the feature, which starts strong and raises bigger questions to which it will return during its otherwise lumpy run. now in her twilight years, marjorie (smith) struggles to remember things big and small, but she’s aided by a handsome hologram (hamm) designed to look and act like her deceased husband, walter. like all primes, walter prime learns more about “himself” by conversing with lois, ingesting knowledge and memories and smartly calling them back up when required .
as the story unfolds, almereyda raises questions about how perspective and time can alter memory: if a painful family event is never talked about or remembered, did it even really happen? at one point, walter recounts a long - ago date with marjorie, where they watched my best friend’s wedding together — only for marjorie to ask him to revise the story to a more romantic movie choice, like casablanca. before long, that becomes the truth they both accept .
the story delves into themes of accepting loss and growing older, following an elderly, arthritic former violinist named marjorie, staring headlong into the decline of old age as her memories begin to fail her. availing herself of a service that provides holographic recreations of deceased loved ones as their survivors would like them remembered, marjorie spends her time with her daughter and son in law, and with an imperfect copy of her deceased husband, walter, as he looked in his 30s and 40s .
compared with ai, people' s imperfections stand out. these imperfections are passed on to the primes. the stories that marjorie shares with walter prime (that he later tells back to her) are the versions she wants to remember. for a variety of reasons, she casually changes details like the movie she was watching with her late husband when he proposed, and even the people involved in certain events. the primes are also designed to mimic verbal signs of hesitation like stuttering or pausing to appear more realistic, and thus more flawed .
as for marjorie prime, this is probably davis’ best film performance in 20 years, and for smith, maybe ever. it is a provocative subject that smith says draws varying interpretations. “some people are creeped out, and some people are comforted about the whole thing, ” she said. “it really is about how we are human and what we do with it. that’s what the piece is about. ” and she should know, having played it so often on stage and now film, but smith notes that she has learned new things about the role over and over with each performance. davis thinks the whole idea of having a prime is not that far off, considering the technological advances in our world. “it’s kind of like cord blood, that when you have a baby they want to save the cord blood for future medical advances. i think we all have to start recording ourselves so that the prime (which is fed information about the deceased human being) can be very accurate. i really think we have to start banking the information, ” she said, adding that making the film reminded her of her own relationship with her father, who lived to be 95. “and yet there were still things that i forgot to ever ask him, and well, nobody knows that now. and it’s not like a prime could know it, i guess, unless somebody told it. they can’t see the past. ”
the production found a house in the hamptons as the primary location. the crew had to juggle their schedule to accommodate smith’s obligations with the theater rehearsals for marjorie prime. though the schedule was a heavy one, singer said smith rose to the occasion. “lois did not behave her age, ” he said. “though she was 86, she was up before everyone, knew her lines and was as young as anyone can expect. at one point, she had to swim in the pool, but the heater wasn’t working. but she did it. ”
walter is a
prime ,
a simulated companion with the density of a high - grade hologram, infinite bandwidth and a capacity for empathy, albeit expressed with a cool robotic edge. serene, attentive and unfailingly pleasant, his only limitation is that he relies on personal information provided by marjorie and her family to develop a fuller understanding of their history together .
i' ll remember that now, ” walter says as he processes each new detail from the past, a sense of gratitude and a hunger to be
more human
seemingly programmed into him .
all that inevitably is part of the process with walter, and almereyda dramatizes this gradual remolding of the past with both playfulness and poetry. marjorie is like a child at story time when walter recounts episodes she has previously shared with him. for instance, when he reminds her how much they enjoyed the julia roberts movie my best friend' s wedding, providing a droll recap of the plot .
what if we went to see casablanca instead ?
suggests marjorie, savvy enough even in her dotage to realize that memories can be finessed .
the actors, for their part, offer performances worthy of such a generously stripped - down platform. davis, in particular, is stoically heartbreaking as a woman who feels increasingly alone in processing and preserving the least pleasant chapters of her past, as well as her mother’s, while smith captures dementia’s rapidly alternating moods of panic, placidity, and fleeting, absolute presence with a wry precision that should resonate with viewers who have had to live beside it. hamm, meanwhile, is most beguiling in a difficult role that balances cold automaton authority with a quasi - human awareness of his deficiencies as a being, in addition to stray, mirthful echoes of the man he’s been programmed to evoke. one leaves “marjorie prime” pleased to have witnessed these actors at work, and rather wishing you’d got to see them tackle this intimate piece in a warmer, flesh - and - blood theatrical context. as with walter prime, however, their projections will suffice .
while the dialogue sounds a bit stagey, it does draw us into the personalities of the characters. marjorie (lois smith), pleasant and voluble, obviously enjoys conversing with dapper walter (jon hamm), and together they explore the subject of her past, recalling, for example, two dogs named toni the family once owned. walter, it seems, can help in the task of recollection because he is marjorie’s husband. or rather, a walking, talking, smiling and very helpful image of her husband as he was several decades before .
the future will be here soon enough, you might as well be friendly with it ,
says the title character played by the magnificent lois smith in marjorie prime. that advice represents a philosophical departure from the usual dire screen depictions of the role technology will play in our lives moving forward. it gives michael almereyda' s exquisitely acted chamber drama a visionary quality, with its depiction of a near - future in which pixel - generated avatars can provide human comfort. naturally, that exchange also comes with risks, being subject to our own propensity for trying to tidy up the past, shaving off the messy edges of imperfect lives .
given the obnoxious flash that often accompanies the science fiction genre, it’s always refreshing to see a film that posits us in the future without the need for overly tiresome exposition and attention - grabbing effects. the technical minutiae of marjorie prime’s conceit isn’t on offer here and neither is a view of the wider effect it has on the world. this is a small film, largely set in just one location, yet its thoughtful meditation on how we construct our relationships and our lives through a frequently unreliable lens of our own making is of universal significance. without conscious awareness, we’re constantly rewriting history with age, the details shifting to fit our own narrative .
in the near future, a time of artificial intelligence: 86 - year - old marjorie has a handsome new companion who looks like her deceased husband and is programmed to feed the story of her life back to her. what would we remember, and what would we forget, if given the chance ?
in the opening scene we’re faced with marjorie’s memory of her marriage, sullied by time and her ill health, contrasted with her holographic husband, whose recollection of the past is the result of his son - in - law’s second hand stories. who is better equipped to remember their relationship? did he propose after casablanca or my best friend’s wedding? like many scenes in the film, we’re thrown into a dialogue without entirely understanding how we got there. there’s a dreaminess to almereyda’s direction, which coupled with a woozy mica levi score, makes marjorie’s house feel otherworldly and we’re never too sure who might be real or artificial .
“we are thrilled to partner with sundance for the 14th year in a row and award the 2017 sloan feature film prize at sundance to michael almereyda' s marjorie prime, ” added doron weber, vice president at the sloan foundation. “with cool intelligence, wit and poignancy—allied to a deft directorial hand and a stellar cast—almereyda explores the emotional landscape of artificial intelligence and dramatizes the emerging impact of intelligent machines on our most intimate human relationships. sloan is also delighted to award three new screenwriting grants at sundance focusing on scientists and inventors who helped shape the modern world as part of our ’non - profit movie studio for science’ and a national development pipeline which has resulted in 20 feature films to date. ”
marjorie prime is an american science-fiction film written and directed by michael almereyda , based on jordan harrison 's pulitzer prize-nominated play of the same name . it stars jon hamm , tim robbins , geena davis , and lois smith . footage was screened for buyers at the 66th berlin international film festival . it premiered at the 2017 sundance film festival . it is scheduled to be released on august 18 , 2017 by filmrise . 
marjorie prime is an american science-fiction film written and directed by michael almereyda, based on jordan harrison's pulitzer prize-nominated play of the same name. it stars jon hamm, tim robbins, geena davis, and lois smith. footage was screened for buyers at the 66th berlin international film festival. it premiered at the 2017 sundance film festival. it is scheduled to be released on august 18, 2017 by filmrise.
marjorie prime is an american science-fiction film written and directed by michael almereyda, based on jordan harrison's pulitzer prize-nominated play of the same name. it stars jon hamm, tim robbins, geena davis, and lois smith. footage was screened for buyers at the 66th berlin international film festival. it premiered at the 2017 sundance film festival. it is scheduled to be released on august 18, 2017 by filmrise.