Celine Song On Navigating The Price Of Modern Romance In Film Materialists

Materialistic — the first word that came to my mind as soon as I watched the trailer. Unsurprisingly enough, Celine Song's film titled Materialists resonates perfectly with the plot. Dakota Johnson's character is that of a matchmaker with an impeccable record of arranging matches. At the ninth wedding of a couple she matched, her seemingly perfect streak of arranging matches for people with diverse demands stops when she encounters her ex (played by Chris Evans) while meeting a potential perfect match (played by Pedro Pascal).

While her new, seemingly perfect match is everything a woman could desire, she is also torn between him and her imperfect ex. One owns a million-dollar apartment, while the other shares his place with roommates. One can seemingly offer her all the luxuries in the world; the other remembers even the smallest details, like her character’s quirky preference for beer with Coke! 

"It was never going to be a conversation about which flavour of a person. It’s actually so much more about this marketplace of dating that all of us live in if you’re single, and also the marketplace that Dakota’s character is navigating," Song told The Associated Press on the project's genesis. 

Releasing on June 13, 2025, this upcoming project is a delight for rom-com fans. 

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Celine Song: Mind Behind Materialists

Celine Song was born in South Korea. Song attended Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, for her undergraduate degree, where she studied psychology with a minor in philosophy, before earning her MFA in playwriting from Columbia University in New York in 2014. Her parents, both artists, moved the family to Markham, Ontario, Canada, when she was 12. Her father, Song Neung-han, is a filmmaker, and her mother is an illustrator and graphic designer.

The writer and director of Materialists began her career in 2019 when her play Endlings was staged at the American Repertory Theater. Her directorial film debut came with Past Lives, for which she also served as the screenwriter. The film was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay.

Past Lives received critical acclaim upon its release and was compared to the work of Richard Linklater, Woody Allen, and Noah Baumbach. Song’s first television screenwriting role was as a staff writer for the first season of Amazon’s The Wheel of Time in 2021. In April 2024, the music video for pop artist Laufey’s song “Goddess” was released, directed by Song.

Song is married to writer Justin Kuritzkes, and the couple reside in New York City.