Ex Machina
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- nb4
I also think the movie was just too heavy-handed and obvious.
Here's a key card! If it doesn't work, that room has a dark secret!
- I loved the mood, but there were so many glaring issues to fully be engaged (at least for me, details, details)formed
- Pretty common in Alex Garland scripts, though.nb
- Maybe someone should tell him, then ;-)formed
- Nah, I want him to do his thing!nb
- Dunno, those details are hard to overlook, but I loved the moodformed
- your criticism of 'details' is lacking in detail. It is what it is - a stylish sci-fi with obvious flaws - like all sci-fi?Ianbolton
- autoflavour1
it was pretty amazing.. there were a lot of plot holes tho.. like how is AVA supposed to survive in the real world if she always had to charge off those special charging pads on the wall..
- what charging pads? I missed thatMiguex
- Charging AVA is not a plot inconsistency, just an unknown.BrokenHD
- One part that seemed forced was how quickly the guy snapped and started cutting himselfyuekit
- she says she uses the charging pads to reverse the flow of the power, which causes the shutdowns.autoflavour
- SteveJobs0
My problem with this film is that the characters are preposterous. The 'smart', socially awkward, nerd employee is aware he's talking to a robot but he's simultaneously developing feelings for it? Sorry no. Anyone in his vocation with his supposed level of intelligence will be too in their head trying to see if he can dupe the ai and to see if it can pass an assortment of tests (ie turing, etc) to their satisfaction but not emotionally bonding with it.
The ceo loner douche-lord who supposedly has the brilliant mind to create such an advanced ai apparently can't design a security system that he can override in the event of an emergency. He's also quite annoyingly unaware of the inherent danger of the rogue bots he himself created. Dude, you designed them. You should be acutely aware of their capabilities and, again, also possess the ability to override their system if things begin to go apocalyptic. This is actually one of the first things you do when designing such a complex program even if you are arrogance - level: infinite like this moron.
Finally, the ai. Despite the nerd's excitement and moody music there's nothing really fascinating or disturbing about this ai. It's programmed to do everything it does and the data it uses is finite data collected from searches and human responses recorded via mobile devices. Boring. Any 'emotions' exhibited by the ai are the result of instructions that produce procedural reactions designed to be perceived as human-like. Any self-awareness was programmed at some level, again for the intent of perception. And so when the emo robot goes into survival mode it's just operating within the parameters of its finite design. A rogue drone that flies into and mangles its creators face isn't seen as some rise of the robots. It just simply acted within the parameters of its design but there just happened to be an unfortunate outcome during its operation or because of a malfunction or design flaw. The only difference here is that this drone exhibits human-like characteristics that we identify with and so some people let themselves get psyched out believing they're seeing end of times, book of revelations type stuff - but they're not. If this were a cyborg, then perhaps there might be reason for awe/concern but this is just a super duper fancy lego mindstorm/arduino on steroids level of creation, albeit with an admittedly cool brain storage/processing unit. But it's really not much more than that. Don't get me wrong, observing a robot and ai that exhibits that level of realism and those types of responses and can learn the way this one does would certainly be quite impressive, but when you know how these types of things are built it really takes the mysticism out of it all.
Yeah it's just a movie, but any film that tries to be as smart as this film seems to think it is should hold itself to a higher standard. Having said all that, I did enjoy many elements of the film - mostly visuals and music but I can't help but think that it could have been done a bit better.
- all true points. But I still really liked it. Forgivable flaws, and I'm sure the writer and director have specific reasons why they told the story this way.inteliboy
- and I thought my assessment was critical! I just wish movies would cover the obvious gaps (security system). It could have been great with a little moreformed
- thought, but I also enjoyed it. As for falling for a robot, I think that's entirely possible, inevitable even.formed
- As buddy said, hear appearance was an intentional distraction. He wouldn't have reacted to her that way if she'd been a grey box.i_monk
- *heri_monk
- Preposterous characters? Like the socially inept social media billionaire who buys all the neighbours houses to ensure his privacy?MrT
- omg0
best scene in the movie....
- shapesalad1
Is this the soundtrack to it?
https://www.discogs.com/master/3…
Never saw the movie but liked some of the tracks from it.
- 'Technoboys Pulcraft Green-Fund' such a cool name.shapesalad
- Heard that soundtrack at the listening booth in Tower Records, Shibuya, Tokyo. Great place to discover music.shapesalad
- Different Ex Machina. Here's the 2014 film's OST.
https://www.youtube.…
Both films are worth watching.MrT - +1 for anything Shibuya tooMrT
- nb-5
Question of the Day.
Which do you think is better: Ex Machina or Interstellar?
I realize they are completely different movies, almost different genres, but they are both sci-fi. And, the budget for Interstellar was over 11x the budget of Ex Machina. Regardless, we are not film producers so money shouldn't factor into our decision.
If you had to pick one as "better" or your "favourite", which would you choose?
- Let me just say that if you pick Ex Machina, you're an idiot.nb
- Ex Machina was more nuanced and fascinating. Interstellar was "YOU ARE FEELING THIS EMOTION RIGHT NOW" the whole time.inteliboy
- Though I'd say interstellar is the "better" film purely from a craft perspective.inteliboy
- Interesting. I'd say relativity, the idea of love as quantifiable, gravity as mutable, etc is much more fascinating than "Some day there will be AI".nb
- what color is better? red or blue?docpoz
- Red. Don't ask stupid questions.nb
- It's like the first day of college again.MrT
- moonpablo28
- Stupid question, red is better. Just check the sales on any type of product.isleptwithsirenstonight
- Interstellar nope!utopian
- Red....unless you're talking red underwear. That's tacky.see_thru
- yuekit0
At one point I thought the "twist" was going to be that he watched the video and found out the tech CEO was also a robot. The original guy died a long time ago and the robots were just self replicating themselves.
- breadlegz0
Couple of months to wait in the UK
- What're you on about? It's on release now?detritus
- oh crap yeah. I read April 2015 somewhere.breadlegz
- haha, I'm in the UK and I managed to see it!BaskerviIle
- i_monk0
The thing is, though, she wasn't lying when she told him where she'd like to go: a busy pedestrian crossing, to watch people. That isn't something that comes out of Googling, it comes out of a preference and desire. It also means she wasn't motivated simply by a sense of self-preservation, because she could have just as easily escaped and stood passively by the door until the next challenge to her survival appeared.
It was a huge oversight not including some sort of Asimovian Laws or voice override of the AI (and house security), however. Smart enough to build an AI, but not smart enough to take foreseeable precautions. (And if everything is key card-based, wouldn't you still have passwords on your computer?)
- qoob0
Really good! 2.75/5
- yuekit1
Great movie. It makes you wonder whether something like this (AI gaining consciousness and passing Turing Test) will happen within our lifetimes. And if so, will it be treated as almost a religious event due to how we have been conditioned by popular culture etc.
- Miguex0
I kept thinking that the interviewer was a robot because he opened his wrist and didn't die
- that's what he was thinking, and realized that he was bleeding really bad, and stoppedmonospaced
- Slitting his own wrists in thinking that he could be unwary of being a robot.omg
- ^great sceneomg
- teh1
Finally saw it last night. Such a great film. The best of the AI sci-fi films.
Question: The guy who pick up AVA? Did he know he was picking her up?Observation. When they stabbed Nathan. Were they self-aware at that point.
Was Kyoko aware when she broke her arms off when she wanted to leave?
Great movie.
