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Kimi -
This is a lean, mean and very fun techno-thriller that sort of plays out like Rear Window for the 2020s. Kimi is not the name of Zoe Kravitz's character - it's Angela - but the name of an Alexa-like device for which she provides production support, a job that lets her afford a dream Seattle apartment. COVID and its resulting lockdown exists in this movie, and this combined with anxiety that strikes at the mere thought of going outside makes Angela's apartment seem more like jail than home. This situation also frustrates Terry (Byron Bowers), a neighbor and frequent visitor, if you will, for how it prevents them from taking their relationship further. Life gets more complicated for Angela when she intercepts a Kimi recording that not only indicates that a crime may have occurred, but also one that certain people would rather she didn't investigate.
Having enjoyed Kravitz's work in Mad Max: Fury Road and Big Little Lies, it was nice to see her play the lead, and she's more than up to the task. Whenever she conveys Angela's fear of leaving her confines - the highlight is when she makes it to the door but cannot go any further - she in turn conveys how so many of us in the same situation still feel about walking into a potential hot zone. The nature of her job and her multiple screens with whom she chats with everyone from her concerned mother (Robin Givens) to her funny if not perverted Romanian hacker friend Darius (Alex Dobrenko) also accurately convey how this decade has made us more comfortable with interacting with devices instead of people. There’s also Angela's pursuit for justice and the higher-ups who stand in her way, which mirrors this decade’s typical front page news story. As for the parts of the movie that label it as a thriller, they highlight Soderbergh's underrated skills in the genre, feature both high- and low-tech solutions to dilemmas and, most importantly, are always tense and surprising, which says a lot since many of them recall moments in classic thrillers like The Conversation and again, Rear Window. Does this mean this movie stands alongside those classics? No, but Soderbergh and company still deserve credit for giving these moments a modern twist and for making them unpredictable despite their familiarity. It ends up being a movie that not only successfully captures 2020s life, but also might make you feel better about it, technological intrusions, depressing news cycle at all. It also has more of a reason to exist than other movies in this specific subgenre (I'm looking at you, Locked Down and How it Ends).
This is a lean, mean and very fun techno-thriller that sort of plays out like Rear Window for the 2020s. Kimi is not the name of Zoe Kravitz's character - it's Angela - but the name of an Alexa-like device for which she provides production support, a job that lets her afford a dream Seattle apartment. COVID and its resulting lockdown exists in this movie, and this combined with anxiety that strikes at the mere thought of going outside makes Angela's apartment seem more like jail than home. This situation also frustrates Terry (Byron Bowers), a neighbor and frequent visitor, if you will, for how it prevents them from taking their relationship further. Life gets more complicated for Angela when she intercepts a Kimi recording that not only indicates that a crime may have occurred, but also one that certain people would rather she didn't investigate.
Having enjoyed Kravitz's work in Mad Max: Fury Road and Big Little Lies, it was nice to see her play the lead, and she's more than up to the task. Whenever she conveys Angela's fear of leaving her confines - the highlight is when she makes it to the door but cannot go any further - she in turn conveys how so many of us in the same situation still feel about walking into a potential hot zone. The nature of her job and her multiple screens with whom she chats with everyone from her concerned mother (Robin Givens) to her funny if not perverted Romanian hacker friend Darius (Alex Dobrenko) also accurately convey how this decade has made us more comfortable with interacting with devices instead of people. There’s also Angela's pursuit for justice and the higher-ups who stand in her way, which mirrors this decade’s typical front page news story. As for the parts of the movie that label it as a thriller, they highlight Soderbergh's underrated skills in the genre, feature both high- and low-tech solutions to dilemmas and, most importantly, are always tense and surprising, which says a lot since many of them recall moments in classic thrillers like The Conversation and again, Rear Window. Does this mean this movie stands alongside those classics? No, but Soderbergh and company still deserve credit for giving these moments a modern twist and for making them unpredictable despite their familiarity. It ends up being a movie that not only successfully captures 2020s life, but also might make you feel better about it, technological intrusions, depressing news cycle at all. It also has more of a reason to exist than other movies in this specific subgenre (I'm looking at you, Locked Down and How it Ends).