PHIL BOWERMASTER: What’s Real? Does It Matter?

Related: Spike Jonze’s Her and the Big Question. “In other words, throughout most of the movie, Samantha may be faking it. And yet, if she is faking it, Theo’s experience is the same as it would have been if she were sincere.”

Plus, from the anything-you-can-do-I-can-do-meta department: “Spike Jonze is a filmmaker. Arguably, everything he does is fake. These people are all just actors pretending to have experiences. If I watch this film — or any film — and feel empathy or surprise or sadness, are these fake emotions? How can they be real if they result from something that’s not real?”