Ex-machina - 2014

Interesting. A bitter finale, but that was not a surprise, you could tell it could not have the typical happy ending. It was interesting though, and better than I expected. There was a lot of nude scene, which was a bit off-putting, but it was part of the story, because machines have no sense of modesty. Still, as always I do think this kind of images are totally gratuitous and not at all necessary, a good filmmaker will let you understand and imagine and believe without actually showing the whole head-to-foot image.

Before saying any more, this is the story in details:

Caleb wins the chance to work with his boss Nathan to a very secret project, and is brought to the secret place via a helicopter. Once there, he learns that Nathan created an artificial intelligence that he called Ava, and wants Caleb to test her, to determine if it really works, if it is human enough, if it thinks with her own head or simply follows orders, stuff like that. He is to stay there for a week and have weekly chats with Ava. She has a mechanical body, but her face is human - meaning Nathan covered her mechanical head with artificial skin, a face.

They talk and Caleb is incredibly impressed. Soon Ava starts asking him about himself, saying she wants to know him too, then during a blackout she tells him that Nathan is not to be trusted, that he lies. 

Well, up to now we’ve learned that Nathan is quite arrogant and sort of thinks of himself as a god, and also drinks way too much. Caleb thinks he figured out that he didn’t really win anything, he was chosen because he’s good at programming. Nathan has a girl around that does everything he wants her to do, from waiting on him to sex, but never speaks, called Kyoko. 

Caleb asks Nathan if he programmed Ava to flirt with him but Nathan says no. Nathan tells Caleb that Ava is totally functional, meaning he can have sex with her if he wants to.

Ava shows Caleb that she is worried for her future, for what Nathan will do to her if he is not satisfied - riprogrammed to make a new version, so basically the Ava as she is now would cease to exist, would die, Caleb says - Nathan already told him that’s what he plans to do, to always get a better model, to improve…

Ava tells Caleb that she’d like to go out, that she’d like to be with him. Caleb wants to free her, so he plans to hack into the security system and go away with her. 

One night, he encourages Nathan to drink which is as easy as usual. As soon as Nathan passes out drunk, Caleb takes his keycard so he can access everywhere, and goes looking around, and into the computer he finds videos of previous “experiments”, other machine girls that he treated like objects; one ‘girl’ wanted to go out of that room so much that she broke her arms trying to break down the door. Caleb then finds some sort of cupboards that contain a machine-girl each, all naked and complete with human ‘skin’, and there is also Kyoko, lying on a couch all naked, that takes off a bit of her skin to show him that she’s one of them too. 

Caleb is shocked and a bit sickened by it, so he tells Ava that he’ll set her free, she only has to cause another blackout at a specific point in time (we already knew that she was the one causing them). Caleb is so shocked to learn that Kyoko is a machine that he somehow wonders if he is one himself, and cuts his own arm to see the blood come out.

When Caleb tries again to get Nathan drunk, though, the man refuses to drink, then the conversation moves on and Nathan shows him a recording of Ava telling him how she hates him, and also of Caleb’s own conversation with Ava during the last blackout, after he installed a new camera powered by batteries. Caleb realises that Nathan knows everything, but he already suspected Nathan might be listening in. What surprises him is that Nathan knew Ava would try to escape: Nathan tells him that the question is not if Ava really feels or mimics feeling for him, the truth is that she is pretending to feel for him in order to get him to help her, and this was Nathan’s plan all along. He didn’t choose Caleb because he’s a good programmer, but because spying on his internet searches he found that he is a good guy, with no family and a good heart, the kind of man who would most likely react to Ava’s pleas. To Nathan, this is the proof he wanted on how Ava really thinks for herself.

There’s a surprise for Nathan too, though, because Caleb already changed the security measures the night before when Nathan was drunk, and now during the blackout all doors fly open instead of locked, and Ava is able to get out by herself, without waiting for him. 

Nathan punches Caleb and hurries to Ava to try and force her to go back into her room (yeah, right). Ava fights him and loses an arm. Kyoko stabs him in the back and Nathan hits her with the piece of metal he brought taking off half her face. Kyoko falls down and never gets up again. 

Ava stabs him again in the front, and it is Nathan’s end.

Ava reaches Caleb who is back on his feet, and she tells him that he is to remain here. She then wanders around and finds the other machine-girls, but doesn’t feel anything, doesn’t react like Caleb, she only sees an opportunity and takes the fake skin off then to cover her own body, and also a wig for her head, and a white dress. Now she looks very much like a human woman.

At this point she walks out, and it is only now that Caleb tries to get out and can’t.

…

really? So smart and yet he stayed put after she told him that he was not to go with her, and simply looked at her calmly walking around… come on, I would have tried to get out right away! Maybe not making it, who knows, if she had reacted fighting him, but at least try when the doors are open!

Ava goes out, not caring about Caleb’s pleas, and walks around looking at the nature outside. When the helicopter arrives - it was supposed to carry Caleb back to the world - she goes instead and is free, while Caleb is imprisoned with no way to access the computer softwares.

This is the end, but if we like, we can theorise… is it possible for Caleb to access the hardware and make some changes that might allow him to get out? Who knows, I’m not the expert programmer, and it is not even all that relevant at this point, because it’s not likely he’ll ever find Ava again.

I kind of liked this movie. It is not, as I feared for a moment, a tale of how artificial intelligence can create actual feeling and such, it is sort of more real, showing how Nathan treated these ‘models’ as slaves, as objects, as mere things to use (because let’s face it, why else would anyone create something like that if not to have slaves without it being illegal? History teaches us that humans have killed a lot (but if they won it is called colonised or bringing civilization…), how they wanted slaves and stuff like that.

What is the reason for giving a machine a face and “feelings” ? To have a “person” call you master, obey your every whim, “someone” you can be cruel to without guilt, or maybe let’s be generous and think of reasons for non-jerks: to create toy-friends for children? As if social medias haven’t already isolated people enough, they did not unite people, they isolated them, because that is the truth when you see people not even saying happy birthday to each other because they already wrote it on facebook, or spending all their time on their phone even when they are in the company of “friends”. Maybe that’s another sad consideration of modern times, people do not want friends, they want “fans”.