The Language Archive

If I had to review The Language Archive in one word, it would be lackluster. Julia Cho's story of a linguist who cannot communicate with the woman he loves also examines what it means--pragmatically, emotionally, metaphysically--when a language dies. While the ideas are interesting, the exploration is predictable, and the minimal plotline is on the boring side. There is little reason to care who ends up with whom, as the three main characters never gel, and the performers fail to inject them with dimensional humanity. The Language Archive is ostensibly a comedy, but much of the humor is as cheap as the curse words used by the older couple who are the last two speakers of their native tongue. ("Oh, isn't it cute--the old folk in the funny costumes are saying 'fuck.')