THX and LUH are centrally assigned roommates. THX is struggling with mental composure and concentration and seeks advice from a confessional style automated booth that reassures him that his dose cannot be increased and everything is as it should be. It becomes clear LUH has been switching THX's drugs and may have been doing so for a while. That night they have sex.
A colleague of LUH, SEN has LUH reassigned and plans to become his new roommate. SEN seems to be some form of computer hacker or criminal but it's not clear exactly what his long term plan might be. THX reports SEN's criminality on his way to work and is highly agitated.
In the background, the panopticon watches all this and the anonymous android police are despatched to detain them all.
Stylistically important, this 70s cult headfuck implies a complex world in a masterpiece of "show, don't tell" filmmaking. There are hints of "religious issues" between older naturally born citizens and younger ones, displays of passionless standardised consumerism contrasted with calls to puritan abstinence and psychiatry via automated chatbot.
It's also boring, clunky and occasionally offensive with a pointless linear narrative that feels like it's missing chunks. I had to go and read the Wikipedia summary to make sure I'd not blanked some bits, but no.
At one point THX ends up seemingly imprisoned in a limitless white psychiatric ward and people just spout bollocks for ages while some unpleasant shit (rape, dehumanising of somebody with dwarfism) kind of happens unremarked in the background. Reunited with SEN, the pair eventually randomly meet somebody else and just walk out. WTF?
LUH appears for more sex then just disappears, killed offscreen and the foetus she is carrying harvested, when she along with SEN seemed to start the story with some agency, unlike THX. This feels as misogynistic as fuck and I'm not really buying that it's the _setting_ that's misogynistic.
Then it concludes with a really terrible car chase. In a tunnel with no other traffic so the only uncertainty is created by the car overheating.
It's over 50 years old so I get why some of the narrative is offensive in modern times. The visuals and world building are amazing but once it gets to the 'psych ward' bit any new elements are total garbage, like Lucas ran out of ideas.
Interesting because of the influence it's had but something to study not enjoy, 5/10.