Title: Molli and Max in the Future (2023)
Director: Michael Lukk Litwak
Writer: Michael Lukk Litwak
Studio: Level 33 Entertainment // Whiskey Bear
IMDb Plot: A sci-fi romantic comedy about a man and woman whose orbits repeatedly collide over the course of 12 years, 4 planets, 3 dimensions, and one space-cult.
Joe Says: Molli and Max in the Future is probably too rom-com centric for sci-fi geeks and too bonko f/x-driven for Hallmark Channel subscribers. However, the Force might yet be strong here and some of the relational dialogue within could hit warp speed with Millennials or Gen-Zers looking for love in the stars.
The indie feature Molli and Max in the Future is being promoted as a sci-fi rom-com. And that’s an accurate enough tag. The movie is sufficiently enjoyable presenting quick-ish dialogue on meaningful relationships with explorations on how dating rituals are just as ridiculous in the 25th century as they are in the 2020s. But the audience for this one is cautiously going to be more niche than expected. Molli and Max in the Future is probably too rom-com centric for sci-fi geeks and too bonko f/x-driven for Hallmark Channel subscribers. However, the Force might yet be strong here and some of the relational dialogue within could hit warp speed with Millennials or Gen-Zers looking for love in the stars.
As with many rom-coms, this one starts with Max falling into Molli’s lap. Or starship. Max hitches a ride and the two talk about life, the universe, and everything. Molli and Max become star-crossed – and star-traveled – lovers. For the most part. As time marches on, the two meet up again and again. On an interstellar bus. In a pan-galactic Uber. Max (Aristotle Athari) eventually becomes a robo-jox. Molli (Zosia Mamet ) a space witch. Finally, fate wins out and the two begin a true friendship. Sex is often discussed but never enacted, opting instead for the constant grind of teasing.
And that teasing – although all dialogue-clever – prevents the narrative from achieving a proper climax. Ahem.
Written and directed by Michael Lukk Litwak, Molli and Max in the Future pays homage to Nora Ephron’s When Harry Met Sally, as well as Woody Allen sex farces, all wrapped around a glitzy sci-fi rendering that looks like the backlot of Luc Besson’s The Fifth Element. Litwak then takes Ephron and Allen’s caffeinated humor and blends it down to a vanilla soy latte. Rude sex and emotional inadequacies are jettisoned in favor of Millennial over-achievement and career depression.
Molli and Max are fun kids yet their on-screen relationship never hits that one defining beat nor is there truly an abrupt turn of conflict. Molli doesn’t pretend to orgasm while visiting a hyper-deli nor does Max sneak out of her bed after counting the astroseconds. Litwak cleverly has his characters talk to extra-dimensional versions of each other (who actually have done, you know, it), but the comedy is not as subversive as, say, Allen’s use of subtitles to contradict the onscreen dialogue between Alvy and Annie in Annie Hall.
Adapting Annie Hall in outer space makes for a great concept. Honestly though, when it comes to sci-fi and love, most Trekkies, Wookies, and Time Lords might instead opt to simply rewatch the Han & Leia scenes from The Empire Strikes Back.
Right? “I know.”
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