For a while I worried that my father was having a thing with his GPS.

He seldom referred to the navigational instrument, which issued instructions in a feminine monotone, as “it.” He said “she” and “her.” He got a kick out of predicting exactly when she’d pipe up and what her advice would be, and he alternately complimented himself on his obedience and crowed over his defiance.

“She’s not going to like this,” he’d trumpet as he played the rebel, going straight instead of left.

“Recalculating,” she’d sigh, and he’d laugh mischievously.

I thought of them when I saw “Her,” a new movie that opens in major cities next week.

Joaquin Phoenix stars as a man in love with the operating system for his smartphone-esque device, a sexy Siri that — or should I say who? — tells him not only when he has mail but what a terrific male he is, and does this in Scarlett Johansson’s come-hither coo. There was much fuss recently over the decision that Johansson was ineligible for the Golden Globes: Should a disembodied voice’s contribution be regarded as any less real than a visible, palpable person’s? The debate echoed questions in the movie itself, which was written and directed by Spike Jonze and was just named the best picture of 2013 by both the National Board of Review and (in a tie with “Gravity”) the Los Angeles Film Critics Association.