Any good Sundance slate has at least one (and usually a dozen) title with a premise that leaves people scratching their heads. Love Me is one of this year’s seemingly enigmatic with a plot description that reads, “Long after humanity’s extinction, a buoy and a satellite meet online and fall in love.”
Coupled with the above official image, a film still of stars Kristen Stewart and Steven Yeun, there were a lot of questions about what this movie actually is. Symbolism? Allegory? Something else?
While the film itself sets up — and delivers to varying degrees of success — questions and musings, the most basic summary is quite literal. In an effective and beautifully animated minute, we see the entire history of Earth, from its formation through the entire existence of humans, right up until the breathtaking moment of extinction. And then we meet a Smart Buoy and a satellite, launched near the end of humanity as a final farewell and message to the universe that we existed. The satellite’s job is to greet any potential interstellar travelers and teach them about who used to inhabit this lonely planet. When the buoy awakes, bobbing in the waves off the shore of the skeletal remains of the Manhattan skyline, she eventually connects with the satellite and the two begin a conversation.
Using a mix of computer animation, animatronics, and live action, Love Me most immediately and easily draws comparisons to WALL-E. Two artificially intelligent machines meet, one is immediately taken with the other, and they eventually form a relationship. Where WALL-E, a Pixar film with a merchandising deal, successfully introduces two adorably anthropomorphized robots to tell its story, Love Me keeps the satellite looking like a satellite and the buoy looking like a buoy. And yet they manage to still become machines we can care about. This is due entirely to Stewart’s and Yeun’s vocal performances.
Over time, the buoy accesses the internet to learn about lifeforms and eventually discovers the social media accounts of a pair of influencers, Deja and Liam. Taking inspiration from their YouTube and Instagram accounts, she names herself Me.Lifeform, or simply Me. The satellite becomes I Am. Connected by the internet which inexplicably still functions, the two meet in basic CG animation in a fabricated apartment, endlessly reliving one of Deja and Liam’s videos: Date Night 2.0. The evening involves a Blue Apron meal kit, animal onesies and Friends on repeat.
As the AI beings evolve, both want more and yet both lack the vocabulary or the life experience to tell each other what they really need or want. This leads to the type of conflict that is necessary for emotional growth, but it goes on for far too long and becomes frustratingly repetitive. It also leads to a conclusion that feels right and honest before becoming both unearned and silly.
The writer/director team of Sam & Andy Zuchero have crafted a film that is quite accomplished and visually interesting. They have a keen sense for the medium and give their actors plenty of room to explore and develop their characters. It is, in many ways, a remarkable debut that showcases enviable talent.
But when it comes to the story, Love Me is far less successful. Sentient AI is a popular concept that dates back at least to 1927’s Metropolis and found new life in the 1960s with 2001. And asking what it means to be human is an oft-explored question too. The Zucheros do little to further either of these ideas. Instead they seem to accidentally present a rather bleak portrait in which the entire history of people, all of our literature, art, and scientific achievement is dismissed in favor of laughing baby videos, cute animal pictures, and memes. What is shown as a snapshot of people living their lives, probably blissfully unaware that it is all about to end.
And there is no discussion of this. Me and I Am form their identities around these two people. Even when one wants to know and experience more than Date Night 2.0, their conversations and actions never go any deeper than the surface. There are a lot of missed opportunities to elevate this film into an unforgettable science fiction epic. Ultimately, like the social media influencers who will apparently be the last representation of us, Love Me is a lot of (very worthwhile) style and little substance.
