Advantageous

The plot: In a dystopian future, an Asian woman approaching middle age is fired from her job at a creepy multinational corporation because they want a younger, more racially ambiguous spokesperson. How far will she go to regain her job?

The premise is definitely interesting, and there were parts of the film that I really liked. However, the story continually came back to tedious metaphysical themes that bored me. In the end, I realized that the film was about the metaphysical themes, and this left me feeling a bit unfulfilled. I suppose it was even more so about cultural criticism, especially a feminist critique of how society treats female aging and beauty. But it kept coming back again and again to these questions of "why am I here", "what is my purpose", and "is there something insubstantial, such as love, that science can't replicate in a lab"?

Kim plays a woman who must make a life-changing choice. Unemployment is skyrocketing, men are pressuring women to leave the workforce, and older workers are seen as hopelessly out-of-touch with the modern market. In fact, humans themselves are being rapidly replaced, and the only way to secure any kind of hope for your child's future is for them to attend the most prestigious schools. The alternative seems to be child prostitution. Most of this is established in the background; if you don't pay close attention, you'll miss it. Unexplained explosions rock the sterility and eerie quiet of the world, and news reports hint at terrorist uprisings because of a hopeless, jobless populace.

So, when you lose your job, that basically means that you've lost everything. What if your employer offers to give you your job back if you'll let them control who you are? So, our protagonist becomes desperate to avoid forcing her own daughter to make these same kinds of desperate choices. What can she do but accept? The question becomes what price she has paid. As the film mulls this over, I began to lose interest. Normally, it takes very little for me to become heavily involved in a character's plight, but, in this case, I struggled. Maybe it's because I don't have kids. For a parent, maybe this would be a more harrowing tale.

There are many admirable aspects to this film, chief among them a woman-centric tale that feels genuine. In some science fiction films, the female protagonist seems to have been written as a male who then gets a gender-flip to mix things up. Or she's a sexual object for the viewers to ogle. There's nothing wrong with a bit of exploitative science fiction, but it's nice to see something with higher aspirations every once in a while. This certainly has that, but it goes so far as to seem pretentious at times.

Maybe this was simply too far outside of my demographic. On the surface, it's got a lot of themes and ideas that appeal to me, but the focus seems to be diametrically opposed to how I would have done it. Less metaphysics, more world-building. If you're interested in feminist science fiction, however, this is rare example. You should at least give it a chance if you're interested in such things. Perhaps you'll be more intrigued by the themes than I was.

I ran across Advantageous on Netflix after starting and stopping a couple of big budget movies. I will concede that I am a sucker for sci-fi, but this is more than sci-fi. It is a question about medical science and implications for humanity. It is also a question about the priorities of society and what poorly chosen ones can cost us. I can honestly say a film has not caught my attention and made me think this much in years. The strength of the film is obvious because it did not rely on elaborate special effects and action scenes to have an impact.

As one reviewer described it, the deliberate choice of everything - from color, to music, to lighting was so well thought out, it was truly watching moving artwork.

And yes, I used the word film to describe this work rather than movie. The two have a definite distinction.

This is quite an intriguing take on the theme of the singluarity. What happens during uploading (transferring the consciousness to a new vessel)? In terms of the cognition, this work seems to reflect the latest advances in terms of the scientific work that has been done the last years. One of the key one of the findings being that the consciousness that we experience is tied to the body and their intertwined growing process. Studies of evolution, robotics and neuroscientists seem to converge on this idea. Enough of guessing the scientific Zeitgeist... What is astonishing about the movie is the fundamental level the theme is approached. Dance is important. It shows from the beginning to the end. And through the very nature of movement, the archaic, the everyday-things, those striving for that higher purpose will probably halt and think (if they see, and not just watch). This work puts great and visionary ideas in a very human context. This review is written with the movie still undigested, so it might sound a bit raw and weird. In any case it made quite an impression on me.

Watching this film made for a beautiful and worthwhile evening. I loved the stillness it evoked, as it asked me to consider what is important in my life.

Samantha Kim, (Jules), did a wonderful job of showing all that a young girl can be: kind, humble, and entranced by the delicate joy that life can hold, while also questioning her place and position in a world that only sees what she can give - instead of what she is.

Jacqueline Kim, (Gwen), evokes the challenges facing many women today - when career and family choices have long lasting results - in a performance full of silence. The cinematography that supports the silence means that Kim's message is heard more than if it were shouted.

The cover image is almost a misnomer as it appears to import more value to the science, when this film is most definitely about the human condition. I absolutely recommend taking the time to watch, think and share.

I can't stop thinking how realistic is this view of the future of a trickle down world, hiding behind the cloaks of computerised and anonymous social systems. Well worth watching, a social commentary wrapped up in a scifi blanket. With humanity struggling and failing to define itself.