Julie And Jack [2003]

When the movie for tonight was announced we didn't think much of it until we saw "directed by James Nguyen" and we knew we were in for a treat. While mostly known for Birdemic, he actually made two films before that, and this romance was his first film.

With all the signature quality of a film you made for a high school foreign language class, we get the story of Jack, poor tech salesman. His sex-obsessed friend tells him to get on a dating website because all your issues can be improved with a relationship and there he meets Lady Renegade. Her actual name is Julie Romanov and she's a computer programmer. She likes to wax poetic about the ephemeral nature of things and Ada Lovelace and does not like to talk about her past. For the first half hour, nothing much happens aside from them getting closer as they go on dates. 

Then suddenly when they are dressed for a Gatsby party and walking through the Fines Arts Palace in San Fran, Jack starts saying things about how he wishes they could meet in real life and not a simulation. We all immediately started placing bets and correctly realized that they have been dating through VR. The next thing we started guessing was, "What's the actual deal with Julie?" None of us believed she was real at that point but was she just AI like in Her or was it more of a "she's dead but programmed herself before she died" deal. Jack spends the next half hour learning about her from a former professor, business partner, an old friend of hers, and an ex before finding her parents. Her mom, played by Tippi Hedrun, reveals that she died two years ago.

Jack breaks up with her because of the sex (no, really, he says that) then goes on a brief soul searching journey to a church that talks about "spiritual love." He decides that he can just date her as the AI reconstruction of a dead girl, and they reunite in virtual reality. Happy ending? I genuinely don't know.

While lacking the glorious CGI of Birdemic, this film has so much to love in its poor acting, silly script, shoddy camera and sound work, and a lot of locations and motifs that are clearly staples of the Nguyen canon. It wasn't really a laugh a minute, but the whole thing was captivating. Maybe Nguyen missed his calling writing for Black Mirror.

Spoon Rating: 7