The “romantic comedy” is an interesting genre of film; you have to showcase romance (a deeply personal and singular experience), and you can’t be too saccharine or too real about it. Either end of the pendulum eliminates a romantic comedy’s greatest muscle – sincerity. The trick with Materialists is that Celine Song merges the two and somehow makes something that feels so dour feel so poppy. How this lands varies, but making the reality sweet is important and not done enough in modern film. Materialists is a sweet and genuine piece of filmmaking.

Dating is tough; who wants to open their best and worst versions of themselves up with a high probability of rejection? Bleh, that’s tough business! Materialists follows a matchmaker named Lucy (Dakota Johnson) who meets a wealthy suitor named Harry (Pedro Pascal) at one of her clients’ weddings. While they are talking, Lucy’s ex-boyfriend, John (Chris Evans), happens to be serving at the wedding and approaches them. Lucy is jaded on the dating scene despite her job and pursues a romantic relationship with Harry.

How Materialists accomplishes what it does is by not shying from the flaws of their core cast. Lucy is superficial, John is immature, and Harry buys away all of his problems, which is an extremely watered-down way to describe them, but none of these characters are okay. In making these characters as messy as they are, there’s something more palpable and real about Materialists. In the real world, people put on these fronts and hide their real selves away out of fear of rejection. And there is some of that with these characters, but once you see who they really are, they all just want love.

In terms of making the “reality sweet,” there isn’t a wistful romance that’ll sweep you away. Romance is a meeting in the middle and connecting, but being vulnerable is frowned upon and not easy. People lash out, people try to push away their real feelings, and Lucy, John, and Harry aren’t immune to this. The dreamy/artificially sweet elements you find in most rom-coms are placed onto the problems, the nasty side of relationships. That will always happen, and any denial of this is either ignorant or immature.

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A lot of criticism has been levied against a heavy subplot in the film, which, for the sake of this piece, won’t be explained further than that. While the topic associated with the subplot is divisive, its application to its core idea is essential. There are terrifying people out there, as well as people who don’t act out of malicious intent but still hurt others. The end result is people who are jaded to the process of dating, and it’s not unfounded to have that reaction. It’s a tough reality that we have to exist in, a reality that hopefully goes away sooner rather than later. Then there’s the matter of reconfiguring yourself. It will take time, but when it’s right, it’ll be worth it.

What sets Materialists apart from most romantic-comedy films is its emphasis on dating. Dating, much like art, is many things and may not look the same to everyone. In the era of social media, dating is based primarily on circumstance first and the person second. There are plenty of people who will make a certain amount of money, have certain physical features that appeal to you, but how many people do you enjoy being around? The film deconstructs superficial ideas of what “love” should be, which is a deeply personal and polarizing topic.

It’s not a bad thing to be superficial, though, as humans are shallow beings. We all have our types, and we all want certain things in partners. People have their standards for hairstyle, height, weight, economic background, and family history. Hell, I won’t lie, I’ve had to work to break down my own ideas of standards when it comes to my romantic partners, and every now and then, they still rear their ugly heads. It’s nasty, and there have been times when my standards got in the way of connecting at a deeper level with someone. In the context of Materialists, that’s all these people would talk about. “I want my partner to come from money,” “She has to be 22 years old,” “I want my partner to be fit” were all standards from the film. But how does that translate to the person behind all of that?

With Materialists, Celine Song wraps up all of these ideas of dating, the nasty side of people, and puts a tender bow on top. It’s a great film that never shies away from the bad. Living in love, living in the bad, and all that jazz is what it’s all about. The bad is what makes the relationships good; you can’t make something solid if you don’t meld it together, warts and all. There is a level at which we should tolerate the bad, but just because you have some bad doesn’t mean it’s all lost. By no stretch should Materialists be the “guidebook to how you approach romantic relationships,” but more people need to dig deeper and think of the person more than the circumstance.