THE STORY – An Artificial Friend named Klara finds a deep bond with a troubled young girl, bringing light and hope to a grieving family through her unwavering devotion and innocent wonder.
THE CAST – Jenna Ortega, Amy Adams, Mia Tharia, Aran Murphy, Steve Buscemi & Natasha Lyonne
THE TEAM – Taika Waititi (Director/Writer) & Dahvi Waller (Writer)
THE RUNNING TIME – 116 Minutes
There was a time when the films of Taika Waititi were deemed by many as delightful. The popular New Zealand filmmaker, whose early works like “Boy”, “What We Do in the Shadows,” and “Hunt for the Wilderpeople” brandished his signature quirky humor, usually packaged with a tender emotionality that often pulled it all together. Then, after a stint in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and an Academy Award for “Jojo Rabbit” (a film that gets a bit more guff than deserved), Waititi’s output as a filmmaker has regressed, slipping into a series of missteps. Now he’s back, adapting a beloved work of acclaimed novelist Kazuo Ishiguro, setting the stage for his return after the tepid sports dramedy “Next Goal Wins.” Unfortunately, most, if not all, of what makes Waititi pleasant is missing from “Klara and the Sun,” a lifeless outing that reminds us his charm may have worn off sooner rather than later.
The film paints another dystopian future as lonely individuals wander crowded, polluted streets, both on the ground and in the air. According to Natasha Lyonne’s Store Manager, these characters live in a post-World War III landscape where the internet no longer exists, and people find it harder to connect. That’s where Klara, played by Jenna Ortega, comes in as an outdated artificial friend who spends her days in peculiar prayers to the sun, which she believes listens, nurtures, and grants wishes. Klara hopes her prayers will be answered so she can escape the run-down shop where she spends her days standing like a mannequin, watching the world move around her.
Her unique personality intrigues Mia Tharia’s Josie, a rebellious young girl who needs something to tether her as her fraught relationship with her workaholic mother, Chrissie, played by Amy Adams, worsens. The suspiciously ill Josie soon pulls Klara out of the shop and into the sun-drenched fields, where Klara learns not only about a world bigger than she could ever imagine, but also the truth of how it really works. Ishiguro’s narrative, which may work better in a more novelistic form, rings hollow cinematically, while Waititi’s iteration reads as a boorish, hope-core spin on Spielberg’s “Artificial Intelligence.” Waititi, along with co-writer Dahvi Waller, can’t find the right comedic wavelength, and each interaction between Klara and her robotic companions comes off as stilted rather than funny. The film’s first half, before Josie’s introduction, is quite irksome to sit through, carried mostly by Ortega’s attempt to keep it afloat.
From Ortega’s perspective, “Klara and the Sun” should’ve been the film to set things back on track. It’s a production that certainly checks all the boxes necessary to wash away the whiff of misfires that’s followed her like the Grim Reaper. Yet her performance here, while valiant in trying to hold together a slog of a film, doesn’t align with Waititi’s style of comedy. It isn’t necessarily a bad performance; Ortega is truly trying to balance Klara’s robotic physicality with the character’s innate whimsical sincerity, but under Waititi’s writing, it becomes grating all too quickly. She’s given no leeway, as most of the physical humor doesn’t land as well as any joke from any cast member. It doesn’t help that Adams, a veteran performer opposite her, gives her nothing to work with. To most people’s surprise, Adams reaches levels of visible disinterest that make it hard to tell where that sentiment subsides, and her character’s monotone expressions begin.
Chrissie’s coldhearted nature, which masks her insecurities about the pain she’s living through, is supposed to be the channel through which Waititi and Adams deliver most of the dramatically charged moments in “Klara and the Sun.” Even these emotional beats ring as hollow as the comedy throughout, and the film is most watchable when Klara, Josie, and Aran Murphy’s Rick, Josie’s love interest whose gifted nature makes him an empathetic voice in their lives, are together. Waititi delivers some nice moments of splendor, and the production design, while creative at times, thrives outdoors, where Klara spends her time discovering life’s beauty.
Michael Giacchino, as always, delivers exemplary work, churning out a score that somehow hints at a flicker of magic in a film that has none to show for it. Despite these flickers of what could have been, Waititi somehow gets lost in Ishiguro’s simplistic messaging in a wannabe heartwarming tale that is exhausting to experience, especially toward its sobering conclusion, which abandons the manufactured liveness that came before.
