'Ex Machina': It's Alive! It's Alive! Maybe
 Popcorn Column
by Michael S. Goldberger
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Universal Pictures
Ava ponders being — or is it just programming — in Alex Garland's thoughtful take on artificial intelligence. |
It was in a diner late at night in a time long, long ago, after the bars had closed, when, opining about current events and the perceived circumstances of my reality, a waitress pressed her hands onto the counter, peered deep into my eyes and asked, "Who's to say what's real?"
Oddly, while he was doubtfully privy to said event, writer-director Alex Garland nonetheless expounds on the waitress' provocative query in "Ex Machina," his hypothetically enticing foray into artificial intelligence. It's the best science fiction to come down the cinema pike in a robot's age.
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Once again, it's the very near future, a conceit never more appropriate. For it is the auteur's premise that AIs, long imagined and anticipated, are but one brilliant keystroke away from their grand entrance into our civilization. Fact is, their personifications are waiting in the wings, way up in a secret, mountaintop acropolis where Internet billionaire/scientist Nathan, expertly played by Oscar Isaac, plies his genius. We visit there courtesy of Caleb, a young programmer employed in Nathan's world-pervading search engine firm.
Portrayed by Domhnall Gleeson, the typically bright-eyed, bushy-tailed nerd won the honor in a companywide contest run by the storied wunderkind. It's all hush-hush, the exact nature of the prize never really divulged; only that the winner will help the boss on a very special project. Shades of all the intrepid novices who have trekked into the dens of Filmdom's great and terrible sorcerers, he gets there by helicopter, the pilot instructing him that he must walk the last couple hundred yards. Then, there it is, behold ... an underground compound, top security and all that.
The art director must have enjoyed the heck out of etching this slice of the Brave New World, a simple, economical set managing to poignantly affirm that this is precisely how today's version of the mad scientist would design his lair and laboratory. Gone are the ubiquitous levers, buttons and switches lining the dark stone walls that witnessed Dr. Frankenstein's ventures into the mysterious realm of manufactured life. It's all Danish modern now, with eye, voice and electronic card recognition controlling the otherwise impenetrable glass doors.
It's certainly a bit eerie and we share Caleb's initial trepidation. But as the brilliant computer geek extraordinaire explains how he has catapulted a quantum leap past mere Silicon Valley riches and into the research of artificial intelligence---the only logical step as he sees it — we start to understand the method to his madness. It's Caleb's job, as long as he signs all sorts of non-disclosure agreements, to appraise the quality of consciousness Nathan has thus far wrought. Specifically, he's to interview Ava.
He will administer the Turing test, named after computer forefather Alan Turing, wherein the tester is to evaluate whether or not a machine's aptitude is distinguishable from human intelligence. The scrutinization will take place in a series of tête-à-têtes. Of course we don't mind the use of an old convention — that filmmaker Garland has taken us down the garden path, so to speak, by making Ava rather mystically beautiful, intriguing and sexy, right down to her midriff's flashing diodes.
So you really can't blame Caleb if he's a bit smitten by Ava, a stunning combination of human pulchritude donated by actress Alicia Vikander and some truly inspired CGI magic. In time, the wondrous creation in plastic and metal wins our sympathy and, like Caleb's Alex in Robot Land, we wonder what will become of the seemingly winsome machine once the testing is completed.
Meanwhile, an exquisitely written, ongoing repartee between Nathan and his handpicked apprentice mulls with absorbing, intellectual intensity the concept, potential and ultimate human responsibilities attending the creation of artificial intelligence. This includes much philosophical pondering: What exactly is human consciousness? And while we're at, what's the secret of life? You know: To be or not to be ... that is the app. The script brims with wit, wisdom and conjecture while dramatically whispering an urgency: Prepare for what ye wreak.
Superb cinematography excellently juxtaposes the claustrophobic fortress with the surrounding mountain wilderness where Nathan and Caleb occasionally move their dialogue, the spatial choreography adding visual metaphor to the cerebral contemplations. But though fashioned in cutting edge form, all this creativity ultimately leads to a traditional, albeit suspense-filled, cat and mouse game fraught with the usual second-guessing and treachery. Still, in classical sci-fi form, the script isn't remiss in its allegorical treatise on humankind.
OK, so I didn't like the ending. But it's realistic and, truth be told, I can't think of another credible if not completely satisfying resolution. Alas, while his Nathan may have created a new life form, filmmaker Garland wasn't able to likewise invent and imbue "Ex Machina" with the first new plot since the original deus ex machina was plopped down on a Greek proscenium.
"Ex Machina," rated R, is a Universal Pictures release directed by Alex Garland and stars Alicia Vikander, Domhnall Gleeson and Oscar Isaac. Running time: 108 minutes
