A.I. (Artificial Intelligence) (Haley Joel Osment, Jude Law) 1/2
I hesitate to piece together a review of A.I. after only having seen it once, because it is such a striking feature that it begs multiple viewings.
About 6 or 7 months ago, on a particularly chilly winter afternoon, the power went out in our quaint Hampton bungalow. That night was an inconvenience, but it was manageable. However, we ended up having a downed power line on our street, and the outage ended up lasting almost two days. This was when it hit us -- everything we do relies on technology. We had nowhere to put the food which was continuing to spoil by the second. We had nowhere to sleep as all of our beds were waterbeds and without the heaters they were colder than sleeping on a sidewalk outdoors. We had no lights, no stove or microwave, no tv, no radio, and of course no heat inside the house itself. As I watched A.I. I found myself frequently pondering our current dependence on technology. It plays with the notion of how far our society could conceivably go in the right or wrong direction (depending on how one interprets the movie's conclusion), and it turns an awkward concept -- that a robot can be programmed to love -- on its head when a group of "advanced" robots in a humanless future ironically seek to understand love from a little "Mecha" boy named David. One of the underlying points, then, becomes: in the end, there could conceivably always be machines inhabiting our planet -- but how long will the humans last?
The question is as old as sci-fi itself, and director Steven Spielberg certainly leaves no penny unspent in presenting a wild but sometimes cold view of our planet in the future. Between the extensive marketing and the tight-lipped publicity surrounding this blockbuster, many fans of summer movies may not get what they bargained for as they leave the theatre. No matter. This is not a film for all tastes, and Spielberg doesn't pretend it to be otherwise. His goal here -- in addition to paying tribute to the late Stanley Kubrick by completing his unfinished work -- is to push our philosophical and intellectual buttons, not our emotional buttons as is so often the case with your typical Spielberg production.
Meshing the two directorial styles (Kubrick composed analytical and sometimes cold scenes, Spielberg relies heavily on mood and effects) is more often successful than not in A.I. We are treated to visual landscapes such as Rouge City, Flesh Fair, and a futuristic Manhattan almost entirely submerged underwater. Yet, except for the occasional landmark here and there, we never really connect with any of these settings in a familiar way. Each seems eerily devoid of humanity, a common thread throughout many of the best sci-fi movies ever made.
Many critics have summarized the plot as being simply about a robot boy who wants to find his mommy. Perhaps, but I think Spielberg is gambling on something larger here. Just as with the utilization of many different settings, we can only relate with the little mecha David (expertly handled by rising star Haley Joel Osment) in an almost Brecht-ian means of dissociation. We are constantly being reminded that he is not human and that, when all is said and done, he loves because he is programmed to, not because he has exceeded his own programming.
A.I. has much more to offer, including a fascinating allegorical take on the classic children's story of Pinocchio, some great special effects, and a charming debut performance by a wondrously compelling stuffed bear named Teddy. Ample moments of joy, suspense, and contemplation are interwoven into what essentially becomes a futuristic road/buddy picture. At certain points, it seems to want to abandon its rational and analytical side (there is a horribly out-of-place scene where the holographic Dr. Know -- voiced by Robin Williams -- is taken almost to the point of buffoonery), but thankfully it primarily stays on course and also climaxes in a masterful homage to Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey.
I can see why many might question A.I. because it follows many different paths, like a circuit board unsure of whether it will generate the proper result. The easiest way to determine if it works is whether or not, by the end, a connection is successfully made. It is. In a mecha way.
