Her has a useful message about trust

Gravity, Hustle top nods

'American Hustle,' 'Gravity' lead Oscar nominations

'Dallas Buyers Club': underdog film turned scrappy Oscar contender

With his not-so-subliminal "the Chinese are coming" message, Jonze could be accused of trying to play to anxiety in the United States over China's emergence as an economic powerhouse. A survey released in mid-December by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the China Strategic Culture Promotion Association found that just 26 percent of the US public believes China can be trusted a "great deal" or a "fair amount". Just 13 percent of the Chinese public said the same thing about the US, according to the data.

Reflecting that mistrust, Jason Farago, writing in the liberal New Republic, called Jonze's use of Chinese locations and signage "shorthand for the future". Expressing the worst-held fears about China, Farago wrote: "A society such as the one in Her, in which even our emotions have been co-opted by corporate entities, is highly unlikely to be a democracy - and given both America's ongoing economic and political meltdown and our unexpectedly slow progress in the development of artificial intelligence, the real story of Her can only be that one ... And our own future, if we aren't careful, could very well end up even scarier than the already grim one Her depicts: one in which we have lost our freedom without even the compensation of Scarlett Johansson whispering in our ears."

No doubt there will be more of this negative talk - particularly as Her continues to garner accolades. Reflecting broad enthusiasm for the film, the Rotten Tomatoes website reported midweek that the movie had won the favor of 93 percent of critics, who rated it 8.6 out of 10, and 87 percent of the audience, who scored it 4.2 out of 5.

Rather than trying to exploit nascent Sinophobia, Jonze's deft use of Shanghai locales ends up achieving a worthwhile purpose - one of the virtues of good art. It makes the audience think - as in thinking about the hazards of letting technology dominate our lives, rather than about China's increasing influence over the US. The film argues that the ability to conduct more meaningful interpersonal relationships is the first step in ending mistrust, not only between two giant nations but around the world.