Wednesday, February 28, 2018

Marjorie Prime - The Movie

So I just watched Marjorie Prime. It is a movie based on an off-Broadway play.  I would be interested in what other people thought, since I loved the play but didn't love the movie.

The basic premise is that sometime, in the very near future, an artificial person (or hologram) representing a deceased relative can be created to give a survivor comfort. In the case of Marjorie, she chooses her husband, when he was much younger. It was a 2015 Pulitzer Prize finalist for best drama.  And, in the theater, I loved it. And the same lead, Lois Smith was in both.
Marjorie and Walter (her deceased husband) on stage. (Lois Smith and Noah Beane)

It was moved to film without too many changes. Of course the male lead was updated from Noah Beane to Jon Hamm and the daughter to Genna Davis and son in law to Tim Robbins. They are all fine. But somehow opening it up slightly, seems to have pulled the heart out of it and reduced the existential question to a minor point.
Walter and Marjorie in the movie (Jon Hamm and Lois Smith)

The play was about reality vs comfortable lies. And the cost of what one loses when you choose to remember only the good times. In the movie, the questions are hit with a sledgehammer, and the answers are barely addressed.

I would be interested if anyone else saw this and what they thought. I wonder if I am being too hard on the show. (It's streaming on Amazon Prime.)