Dakota Johnson’s R…

Celine Song’s follow-up to Past Lives was always going to be watched closely. Her 2023 debut earned two Academy Award nominations and $42 million at the global box office on a modest budget, which was an extraordinary result for an intimate, dialogue-driven romance.

Materialists, her second film, raised the stakes considerably: a bigger budget, three of the most in-demand stars in Hollywood, and a premise built around the specific anxieties of modern dating. Materialists divided audiences since its release on June 13, 2025, when it grossed $100 million at the worldwide box office, becoming the first independent movie of 2025 to reach the milestone and A24’s third film to do so.

Now, after its 147-day theatrical window, Materialists is back to ruling HBO Max, where it is currently sitting at No. 9 on the platform’s US Top 10 Movies chart, per FlixPatrol.

The hit A24 movie follows Lucy, an ambitious young New York City matchmaker who finds herself torn between the perfect rich match and her imperfect ex-boyfriend. Dakota Johnson plays Lucy, with Pedro Pascal as Harry, a wealthy financier who appears to tick every box on paper, and Chris Evans as John, a struggling actor and Lucy’s former partner who refuses to stay in the past.

Materialists was written and directed by Song and produced by David Hinojosa, Christine Vachon, and Pamela Koffler through Killer Films and 2AM, with cinematography by Shabier Kirchner.

Its script blends satire with sincerity as it explores all the moving parts of love and dating in the 2020s, earning a 78% Certified Fresh score on Rotten Tomatoes, with critics praising Song’s control of tone and chemistry between its three leads. Audience reception was more mixed, with only 65%, largely because of the ending — which was in itself a commentary on relationships in the modern age.

Why Materialists Is Celine Song’s Most Ambitious Film Yet

Image via Atsushi Nishijima/A24

What distinguishes Materialists from the standard romantic comedy is the same quality that made Past Lives so compelling — Song’s refusal to deliver an easy resolution. Lucy’s dilemma is not simply between two men but between two versions of herself. One has built a career on identifying what makes a perfect match, and one cannot apply the same criteria to her own life.

Song’s next project is writing a sequel to the 1997 Julia Roberts film My Best Friend’s Wedding, a choice that speaks to her growing interest in romantic comedies that resist their own genre conventions. Materialists is only A24’s third movie to cross the $100 million global threshold, placing it in rarefied company for an adult-oriented original romance in an era when the genre has largely abandoned theatrical ambitions. Its HBO Max success gives it the mainstream platform its box office performance suggested it always deserved, and a second wave of viewers is clearly embracing it all over again.

Materialists is streaming on HBO Max.