Adi’s TL;DR Oscar Isaac is the one to get down with on Saturday Night!
Sahil’s TL;DR If you’re gonna have a crazed robot at home, teach them a ‘safe word’!
Science or faff? Enough CGI or bat-shit crazy CGI? Aliens or machines? When you’re embarking on a sci-fi movie these are things this genre has to work with to keep it interesting. So when you come across a sci-fi flick that barely uses any of the above, and still gets you hooked from the word go, you sit up straight and take notice. Ex_Machina was the one film from the Oscar picks that both of us wanted to see right after we finished watching the trailers. And it didn’t disappoint! One of us (I ain’t gonna say which one) started watching after two glasses of wine but the film had such an effect, the ‘buzz’ flew out the window within the first fifteen minutes.
Here’s some dope on Ex_Machina. Believe it or not, Ex_Machina is Alex Garland’s directorial debut. Best known for his 90’s cult novel ‘The Beach’, Garland is also the screenwriter behind 28 Days Later and Sunshine. With this one, he adds directing to his list of skills too! Ex_Machina has been a fan favorite and has received a bunch of nominations for original screenplay, visual effects and supporting actors. Interestingly, all the three protagonists Alicia Vikander as Ava, Oscar Isaac as Nathan and Domhnall Gleeson as Caleb, are being looked at as supporting cast. It’s one of those films where there are no lead roles, in the traditional sense of the term. Alicia Vikander and Oscar Isaac have received several nominations for their stellar performances as Ava and Nathan. But when it came to Academy voters, the critical acclaim and the novelty of Ex_Machina, did not translate to nominations, keeping its tally to two for Best Original Screenplay and Best Visual Effects. Guess, that could mean three things – 1) 2015 was a great year for hollywood! 2) Ex_Machina was a beginning of the year release, not top of mind and 3) Oscar voters aren’t known for their smarts. Our best guess – all of the above!
Ex_Machina is science fiction with a difference. Garland’s work has been deeply influenced by science and existentialism and you see those same themes emerge in this one too. The film takes us to the dark recesses of the ethics in science debate. The story wastes no time in build up and straight gets to the point by introducing us to the three protagonists right at the beginning of the film and showing some of the key scenes teased in the trailer in the first 30 minutes. Clearly the people cutting the trailer knew what they were doing! Ex_Machina starts with Caleb, a nerd working at the Google-esque Blue Book, the world’s biggest search engine as a coder winning the chance to be part of something cool with the founder of Blue Book, super scientist, Nathan. Nathan’s position of power and control is established within minutes of the film starting, when we’re shown Caleb flying over his estate and the high tech man-cave he’s built as a recluse for his scientific research. This is even before we meet Nathan. The basic plot of Ex_Machina, involves Nathan conducting a Turing Test with the help of Caleb on the AI he’s built, Ava. But it quickly becomes clear that the one being tested is Caleb and the true test is for Ava to prove that ‘it’s’ just as human.
Nathan Bateman is the modern day Victor Frankenstein. You can’t help but draw comparisons to Mary Shelley’s, 19th century sci-fi, horror classic ‘Frankenstein’. Frankenstein is considered to be the first science fiction novel, written by Shelly when she was 18. So to everyone who believes men get science better than women – In your face, men! The film is using several of the tropes created by Mary Shelley, but what makes Ex_Machina unique are the ways in which it’s making the story of Frankenstein contemporary. In the novel, Victor Frankenstein’s creation remains unnamed, referred to as ‘creature’ or ‘monster’ or ‘it’ and there is no clear gender assigned, though it’s safe to assume that it’s a man. The creation is also scary to look at and Victor experiences feelings of hatred, disgust and even remorse for creating it. Ex_Machina inverts this on it’s head, when Nathan names his creation Ava (clearly a play on Eve), and gives her both gender and sexuality. Nathan is obsessed with his AI creations and clearly ‘form factor’ plays a big role! By giving Ava an identity, a personality, Ex_Machina further complicates the man vs. machine debate.
Ex_Machina is ‘a stripped to the basics’ sci-fi film that revolves around its three protagonists and the games they play, not Hunger Games just games. Of the three, Caleb is the easiest to understand and empathize with, so you’d perhaps start watching the action unfold from his perspective. You can’t help but pity Caleb as he struggles to figure out who to trust in this maze as he finds himself in the middle of a tug of war between Ava and Nathan. Add to that his own insecurities as he compares himself to Nathan who’s a superior both physically and mentally and you have a highly vulnerable character, open to manipulation. And this brings us to Ava. She is Nathan’s ‘almost human’ AI. She’s attractive, she’s smart and she is aware of her growing influence on Caleb. She has a read on him that’s accurate to the T, as she analyses his ‘microexpressions’ and plays up her sexuality to draw him in. But it’s Oscar Isaac’s Nathan, the mad scientist who has tipped over, that has your complete attention. Nathan is the Alpha Male, the one who’s in control, for at least most of the film. He is at the heart of the ethical debate ‘should you take the next step, just because you can’? He has come unhinged, but there is no confusion, no clutter in his mind. It’s the kind of focus, the kind of obsession that’s all consuming. His life is stripped to the basics – minus the distractions of luxury and excesses. Towards the end of Ex_Machina, it’s him you want to see more than Caleb or even Ava! From all his conversations with Caleb where he’s trying to be a friend and a ‘bro’ but can’t hide his sense of superiority in every way to the perfectly choreographed dance with his other android Kyoko, this is one cuckoo genius we’re willing to watch again!
Nathan creates Ava in his own reflection and by giving her gender and sexuality, you have an alpha-female in the room. These two dominant characters play with the mouse, Caleb, in this homemade experiment. While Nathan uses raw physicality and brute mental force to overpower Caleb, Ava uses demure submission and latent sexuality to draw Caleb towards her. In this voyeuristic power-play the audience is the one that’s manipulated from the start of the film where we can’t trust any of the three characters. All three are putting on an act at one time or another and as viewers you can’t fully align with either of them. Power centers in the film shift rapidly with Nathan literally running this experiment from his control room as the film begins, only to be outsmarted by the mouse Caleb who’s ultimately taken for a ride by Ava. Gender adds another dimension to this already charged situation. Between session 3 and 4, when Caleb asks Nathan about why he gave Ava sexuality, Nathan replies ‘Can you give an example of consciousness at any level, human or animal, that exists without a sexual dimension’. Gender is clearly established as another rung of power politics in the film. Nathan gives his AI creations feminine form but uses them without a care for their individuality. Ava and Jade are kept under restraint both desiring freedom, with Jade destroying herself. Kyoko who is used by Nathan as his slave and fuck-toy, is kept outside the cage but denied language and the ability to communicate verbally. For Nathan they’re nothing but experiments to be used and discarded as he deems fit. Ava on the other hand uses her sexual awareness effectively to tame Caleb and deploys him as a means of escape. For her sexuality is a mere tool for survival where the two males represent a threat to her freedom.
Ex_Machina is engaging, interesting cinema. It’s a well made, well thought out film for most parts and that’s perhaps why the ending sticks out as a weak link, leaving a lot to be desired. Clearly they wanted to leave things as open ended as possible to start where they left off in the sequel! From Caleb drugging Nathan to steal his keys, which is such a cliched trick to Nathan resorting to simple violence instead of relying on his intellect, the ending appears too simplistic and almost out of character. Why and how do Kyoko and Ava come together? How does Ava communicate with Kyoko who’s clearly not been given language? Why didn’t Nathan have a backup plan? For all these reasons, the ending feels a little rushed and not well planned. The kicker though comes with Ava walking out, leaving Caleb stranded, reminding everyone that she’s an AI, devoid of human ethics and judgement.
Here’s the ‘one stand out moment’ for each of us. And for a change it’s just one! Both of us couldn’t help but pick the crazed ‘non sequitur’ (as Oscar Isaac put it) dance sequence with Nathan and Kyoko dancing to Oliver Cheatham’s 1983 disco song ‘Get down Saturday Night’. It comes totally out of the blue in a moment, that’s super intense. From Kyoko starting to strip to Nathan standing in the corner watching (as usual), you simply don’t know where this is going and then all of a sudden you find yourself in the eeriest dance club ever! This one is going in the book for legendary dance scenes. It almost has the same thrill as watching John Travolta and Uma Thurman in the famous Pulp Fiction dance. Except it’s just two decades later and way crazier. When Ex_Machina 2 happens (there’s no question of if in our minds!), Oscar Isaac better have a dance sequence in it 😉 It’s the one scene in the film that totally has you and was our pick too!
Alex Garland has done some rather interesting jazz with Ex_Machina. He takes a fairly well used trope, Artificial Intelligence, but plays with it a lot more intelligently than most. Create an android completely at par with humans with an instinct for survival, throw in a mad scientist, who obviously thinks he’s nothing short of god, and, a budding fella out to make his mark, who’d take praise from a caged robot, with a fair bit of gender and power play and you have a powder keg ready to blow! For once you see more movie and less CGI which these days is such a welcome break. Sci-fi films are busy with hordes of people and machines but Garland strips the movie to its bare basics giving you three unstable characters and a looming ethical debate. The plausibility of this happening in the near future gives this part sci-fi part psychological thriller a totally different edge. At the end of the film the lines between right and wrong, and good and evil are so blurred, that you find yourself incapable of hating either the manipulative Ava, the gullible Caleb, or the insolent Nathan.
P.S. Frankenstein is the inventor not the monster; Name’s a bit misleading but you can blame Mary Shelley for that ;D
Until next time, keep the popcorn tub handy!
Adi & Sahil
@ThePopcornWaltz