Arriving not long
after the uninspiring film about the man comes the seductive film about his
ideas. Ex Machina explores the Turing
test, where AI is established through a series of tests. Isolating its few
characters in a billionaire’s mountain home/research centre places the film in
the realm of horror as well as science fiction.
Written and directed by
Alex Garland, what is obvious from the trailer alone is that Ex Machina is a beautiful film. Less
clear is that it is also an intelligent film, linking Gleeson’s Caleb (smart,
but out of his depth) with the audience (assumed to be smart and also out of
our depth) and throwing us into an isolated setting with an unpredictable scientist
playing god. Sounds like a horror film and it does employ many of the genre’s
conventions including the suspense, but without the jumps.
Ex Machina asks a lot of intelligent questions and although the ending asks some
of the wrong type of questions (plot holes), it’s a rare form of mainstream,
contemporary science fiction: character rather than action driven.
No comments:
Post a Comment