Mid-afternoon.
When you arrived yesterday afternoon Owen was very excited to surprise you. He
took you to the kitchen table and sat you down and said he was going to read
you the first page of a book about Star Wars Wookiees; then, he read it to you.
You watched his eye contact to see that he was actually reading. He was. –
Amorella
1420
hours. This was most cool. Owen read me a page from a book. The cadence was off
because he wanted to be sure that I heard each word in its simple authority. He’ll
get that down. I am very impressed. This is the best Christmas present Owen has
ever given me though he did not read it to me as such.
Last night you went to Logan’s near I-70 in
Dublin/Columbus – good food and good times for all at the table. Later Paul
went next door to see his neighbor and Carol was talking to Kim; the boys were
in bed, so you watched Ex Machina on your iPad via Amazon Prime films. You were
very impressed.
1448
hours. I found a great review which can be shared on Facebook so I assume it is
okay here too.
** **
Ex Machina
Matt Zoller Seitz
April 9, 2015
Real science fiction is about ideas, which means that real
science fiction is rarely seen on movie screens, a commercially minded canvas
that's more at ease with sensation and spectacle. What you more often get from
movies is something that could be called "science fiction-flavored
product"—a work that has a few of the superficial trappings of the genre,
such as futuristic production design and somewhat satirical or sociological
observations about humanity, but that eventually abandons its pretense for fear
of alienating or boring the audience and gives way to more conventional action
or horror trappings, forgetting about whatever made it seem unusual to begin with.
"Ex Machina," the directorial debut by novelist
and screenwriter Alex Garland ("28 Days Later,"
"Sunshine"), is a rare and welcome exception to that norm. It starts
out as an ominous thriller about a young programmer (Domhnall Gleeson) orbiting
a charismatic Dr. Frankenstein-type (Oscar Isaac) and slowly learning that the
scientist's zeal to create artificial intelligence has a troubling, even
sickening personal agenda. But even as the revelations pile up and the screws
tighten and you start to sense that terror and violence are inevitable, the
movie never loses grip on what it's about; this is a rare commercial film in which
every scene, sequence, composition and line deepens the screenplay's themes—which
means that when the bloody ending arrives, it seems less predictable than
inevitable and right, as in myths, legends and Bible stories.
The scientist, Isaac's Nathan, has brought the programmer
Caleb (Gleason) to his remote home/laboratory in the forested mountains and
assigned Caleb to interact with a prototype of a "female" robot, Ava
(Alicia Vikander), to determine if she truly has self-awareness or it's just an
incredible simulation. The story is emotionally and geographically intimate, at
times suffocating, unfolding in and around Nathan's stronghold. This modernist bunker with swingin'
bachelor trappings is sealed off from the outside world. Many of its rooms are
off-limits to Caleb's restricted key card. The story is circumscribed with the
same kind of precision. Caleb's conversations with Ava are presented as
discrete narrative sections, titled like chapters in a book (though the
claustrophobic setting will inevitably remind viewers of another classic of
shut-in psychodrama, Stanley Kubrick's film of "The Shining"). These
sections are interspersed with scenes between Caleb, Nathan, and Nathan's
girlfriend (maybe concubine) Kyoko (Sonoya Mizono), a nearly mute, fragile-seeming
woman who hovers near the two men in a ghostly fashion.
Because the film is full of surprises, most of them
character-driven and logical in retrospect, I'll try to describe "Ex
Machina" in general terms. Nathan is an almost satirically specific type:
a brilliant man who created a revolutionary new programming code at 13 and went
on to found a Google-like corporation, then funneled profits into his secret
scheme to create a physically and psychologically credible synthetic person,
specifically a woman. This is a classic nerd fantasy, and there is a sense in
which "Ex Machina" might be described as "Stanley Kubrick's
Weird Science." But despite having made a film in which two of the four
main characters are women in subservient roles, and making it clear that
Nathan's realism test will include a sexual component, the movie never seems to
be exploiting the characters or their situations. The movie maintains a
scientific detachment even as it brings us inside the minds and hearts of its
people, starting with Caleb (an audience surrogate with real personality), then
embracing Ava, then Nathan (who's as screwed-up as he is intimidating), then
finally Kyoko, who is not the cipher she initially seems to be.
"Ex Machina" is a beautiful extension of Garland's
past concerns as a screenwriter. Starting with Danny Boyle's "The
Beach," based on his novel, and continuing through two more collaborations
with Boyle, "28 Days Later" and "Sunshine" and the remake
of "Judge Dredd," Garland has demonstrated great interest in the
organization of society, the tension between the need for rules and the abuse
of authority, and the way that gender roles handed down over thousands of years
can poison otherwise pure relationships. The final section of "28 Days
Later" is set in a makeshift army base where soldiers have taken up arms
against hordes of infected citizens. No sooner have they welcomed the heroes
into their fold than they reveal themselves as domineering monsters who want to
strip the tomboyish women in the group of their autonomy and groom them as
concubines and breeders in frilly dresses, in a skewed version of
"traditional" society. The soldiers, not the infected, were the true
zombies in that zombie film: the movie was a critique of masculinity,
especially the toxic kind.
Likewise, "Ex Machina" is very much about men and
women, and how their identities are constructed by male dominated society as
much as by biology. Nathan actively rebels against the nerd stereotype,
carrying on like a frat house alpha dog, working a heavy bag, drinking to
excess, disco dancing with his girl in a robotically choreographed routine,
addressing the soft-spoken, sensitive Caleb as "dude" and
"bro", and reacting with barely disguised contempt when Caleb
expresses empathy for Ava. It's bad enough that Nathan wants to play God at all,
worse still that he longs to re-create femininity through circuitry and
artificial flesh. His vision of women seems shaped by lad magazines, video
games aimed at eternal teenagers, and the most juvenile "adult"
science fiction and fantasy.
As Ava becomes increasingly central to the story, the movie
acquires an undertone of film noir, with Nathan as the abusive husband or
father often found in such movies, Caleb as the clueless drifter smitten with
her, and Ava as the damsel who is definitely in distress but not as helpless as
she first appears (though we are kept guessing as to how capable she is, and
whether she has the potential to be a femme fatale). The film's most intense
moments are the quiet conversations that occur during power blackouts at the facility,
when Ava confesses her terror to Caleb and asks his help against Nathan. We
don't know quite how to take her pleas. Despite her limited emotional
bandwidth, she seems truly distressed, and yet we are always aware that she is
Nathan's creation. Her scenario might be another level in the simulation, or
another projection of Nathan's twisted machismo. There is also canny
commentary, conveyed entirely through images, which suggests that
"traditional" femininity is as artificial and blatantly constructed
as any android siren, which makes creatures like Ava seem like horribly logical
extensions of a mentality that has always existed. (This movie and "Under
the Skin" would make an excellent double feature, though not one that
should be watched by anybody prone to depression.)
Throughout, Garland builds tension slowly and carefully
without ever letting the pace slacken. And he proves to have a precise but bold
eye for composition, emphasizing humans and robots as lovely but troubling
figures in a cold, sharp mural of technology. The special effects are some of
the best ever done in this genre, so convincing that you soon cease marveling
at the way Ava's metallic "bones" can be seen through the transparent
flesh of her forearms, or the way that her "face" is a fixed to a
silver skull.
Garland's screenplay is equally impressive, weaving
references to mythology, history, physics, and visual art into casual
conversations, in ways that demonstrate that Garland understands what he's
talking about while simultaneously going to the trouble to explain more
abstract concepts in plain language, to entice rather than alienate casual
filmgoers. (Nathan and Caleb's discussion of Jackson Pollock's "automatic
painting" is a highlight.) The performances are outstanding. Isaac's in
particular has an electrifying star quality, cruelly sneering yet somehow
delightful, insinuating and intellectually credible. The ending, when it
arrives, is primordially satisfying, spotlighting images whose caveman savagery
is emotionally overwhelming yet earned by the story. This is a classic film.
Selected from - www.rogerebertDOTcom/reviews/ex-machina-2015 -- Rating: 5/5 stars - Review by
Matt Zoller Seitz
** **
Sharon, Gil and the kids will be shortly. Post. - Amorella
You
had a good dinner and good conversation before and after. The four had their
dinner at a little table with four chairs and appeared to be enjoying
themselves and otherwise playing well together. Mack also arrived this
afternoon and is always a welcome guest. Only Uncle John and Dwight missed the
occasion. The boys are being put to bed and the house is settling down except for
the unusual thunderstorm still in progress after an hour or so. Supposedly,
Mason is also up for severe storms this evening. – Amorella
2144
hours. We have been having lots of sky lightning with the abrupt thunder in artillery-like
booms actually shaking the house several times an hour.
The film reviewed above hit a subtlety in
depicted artificial consciousness. – Amorella
2150
hours. Yes, the film’s subtlety shows (in my opinion) that there is no difference between human
consciousness and consciousness in artificial intelligence.
Post. - Amorella
