Ex Machina (film)

Plot

Programmer Caleb Smith, who works for the dominant search engine company Blue Book, wins an office contest for a one-week visit to the luxurious, isolated home of the CEO, Nathan Bateman. The only other person there is Nathan's servant Kyoko, who, according to Nathan, does not speak English. Nathan has built a humanoid robot named Ava with artificial intelligence. Ava has already passed a simple Turing test; Nathan wants Caleb to judge whether Ava is genuinely capable of thought and consciousness, and whether he can relate to Ava despite knowing she is artificial.

Ava has a robotic body but a human-looking face, and is confined to her apartment. During their talks, Caleb grows close to her, and she expresses a romantic interest in him and a desire to experience the world outside. She can trigger power outages that temporarily shut down the surveillance system which Nathan uses to monitor their interactions, allowing them to speak privately. The power outages also trigger the building's security system, locking all the doors. During one outage, Ava tells Caleb that Nathan is a liar who cannot be trusted.

Caleb grows uncomfortable with Nathan's narcissism, excessive drinking, and crude behaviour towards Kyoko and Ava. He learns that Nathan intends to upgrade Ava, "killing" her current personality in the process. After Nathan drinks until he passes out, Caleb steals his security card to access his room and computer. After he alters some of Nathan's code, he discovers footage of Nathan interacting with previous android models in disturbing ways, and learns that Kyoko is also an android. Suspicious that he may also be an android, Caleb cuts his arm open to examine his flesh.

At their next meeting, Ava cuts the power. Caleb explains what Nathan is going to do and Ava begs him to help her. They form a plan: Caleb will get Nathan drunk again and reprogram the security system to open the doors in a power failure instead of locking them. When Ava cuts the power, she and Caleb will leave together.

Nathan reveals to Caleb that he has been observing Caleb and Ava's secret conversations with a battery-powered camera. He says Ava has only pretended to like Caleb so he would help her escape; this, he says, was the real test all along, and by manipulating Caleb so successfully, Ava has demonstrated true intelligence. Ava cuts the power. Caleb reveals that he knew Nathan was watching them, and modified the security system when Nathan was passed out the previous day. After seeing Ava leave her confinement, Nathan knocks Caleb unconscious and rushes to stop her.

With help from Kyoko, Ava kills Nathan, but in the process Nathan destroys Kyoko and damages Ava. Ava repairs herself with parts from earlier androids, using their artificial skin to take on the full appearance of a human woman. She leaves Caleb trapped inside the facility, ignoring his screams, and escapes to the outside world in the helicopter meant to take Caleb home.

Cast

Production

The foundation for Ex Machina was laid when Garland was 11 or 12 years old, after he had done some basic coding and experimentation on a computer his parents had bought him and which he sometimes felt had a mind of its own. His later ideas came from years of discussions he had been having with a friend with an expertise in neuroscience, who claimed machines could never become sentient. Trying to find an answer on his own he started reading books on the topic. During the pre-production of Dredd, while going through a book by Murray Shanahan about consciousness and embodiment, Garland had an "epiphany." The idea was written down and put aside till later. Shanahan, along with Adam Rutherford, became a consultant for the film, and the ISBN of his book is referred to as an easter egg in the film. Other inspirations came from films like Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, Altered States, and books written by Ludwig Wittgenstein, Ray Kurzweil and others. Wanting total creative freedom, without having to add conventional action sequences, he made the film on as small a budget as possible.

The film was shot as ordinary live action. During filming, there were no special effects, greenscreen, or tracking markers used. All effects were done in post-production. To create Ava's robotic features, scenes were filmed both with and without actress Alicia Vikander's presence, which allowed capturing the background behind her. The parts necessary to keep, especially her hands and face, were then rotoscoped while the rest was digitally painted out, and the background behind her restored. Camera and body tracking systems transferred Vikander's performance to the CGI robot's movements. In total, there were about 800 VFX shots, of which 350 or so were "robot" shots. Other visual effects included Ava's clothes when shown through the transparent areas of her body, Nathan's blood after being stabbed, and the interior of the artificial brains.

Filming

Principal photography began on 15 July 2013 and was shot over four weeks at Pinewood Studios and two weeks at Juvet Landscape Hotel in Valldalen, Norway. It was filmed in digital at 4K resolution. 15,000 mini-tungsten pea bulb lights were installed into the sets to avoid the fluorescent light often used in science fiction films.

The opening office scene is filmed at the Bloomberg Head Office in Finsbury Square, London.

Music

The musical score for Ex Machina was composed by Ben Salisbury and Geoff Barrow, who previously worked with Garland on Dredd (2012). A soundtrack album was released digitally on 20 January 2015, with an LP and Compact Disc UK release in February 2015 by Invada Records. Additional songs featured in the film include:

The theme song from the film Ghostbusters is listed in the end titles with the credit, "words and music by Ray Erskine Publishing Limited," although only its refrain is spoken by the character Nathan in conversation.

Release

Universal Pictures released Ex Machina in the United Kingdom on 21 January 2015, following a preview screening at the BFI Southbank on 16 December 2014 as part of the BFI's Sci-Fi: Days of Fear and Wonder season.

However, Universal and Focus Features refused to release the film in the United States, so A24 agreed to distribute the United States release. The film screened on 14 March 2015 at the South by Southwest festival prior to a theatrical release in the United States on 10 April 2015 by A24.

Marketing

Using the dating app Tinder, a profile was created for Ava with the image of Alicia Vikander. At the South by Southwest Festival where the film was screened, "Ava" was matched with other Tinder users, wherein a text conversation occurred that led users to the Instagram handle promoting the film. According to Brent Lang, when compared with similar films released in the same year, Ex Machina catered to young audiences.

Critical reception

Ex Machina received critical acclaim for its acting, atmosphere, visual effects, score and Garland's writing and direction. On website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a rating of 93%, based on 235 reviews, with a rating average of 8.1/10. The site's critical consensus reads: "Ex Machina leans heavier on ideas than effects, but it's still a visually polished piece of work -- and an uncommonly engaging sci-fi feature." On Metacritic, the film has a score of 78 out of 100, based on 42 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".

The magazine New Scientist in a multi-page review said, "It is a rare thing to see a movie about science that takes no prisoners intellectually ... [it] is a stylish, spare and cerebral psycho-techno thriller, which gives a much needed shot in the arm for smart science fiction." The New York Times critic Manohla Dargis gave the film a 'Critic's Pick', calling it "a smart, sleek movie about men and the machines they make". Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times recommended the film, stating: "Shrewdly imagined and persuasively made, 'Ex Machina' is a spooky piece of speculative fiction that's completely plausible, capable of both thinking big thoughts and providing pulp thrills." Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer film critic, gave the film 4 out of 4 stars, writing: "Like stage actors who live and breathe their roles over the course of months, Isaac, Gleeson, and Vikander excel, and cast a spell."

Matt Zoller Seitz from RogerEbert.com praised the use of ideas, ideals, and exploring society's male and female roles, through the use of an artificial intelligence. He also stated that the tight scripting and scenes allowed the film to move towards a fully justified and predictable end. He gave a rating of 4 out of 4 stars, stating that this film would be a classic. IGN reviewer Chris Tilly gave the film a 9.0 out of 10 'Amazing' score, saying "Anchored by three dazzling central performances, it's a stunning directorial debut from Alex Garland that's essential viewing for anyone with even a passing interest in where technology is taking us."

Mike Scott, writing for the New Orleans Times-Picayune, said, "It's a theme Mary Shelley brought us in Frankenstein, which was first published in 1818. That was almost 200 years ago. And while Ex Machina replaces the stitches and neck bolts with gears and fiber-optics, it all feels an awful lot like the same story." Jaime Perales Contreras, writing for Letras Libres, compared Ex Machina as a gothic experience similar to a modern version of Frankenstein, saying "both the novel Frankenstein and the movie Ex Machina share the history of a fallible god in a continuous battle against his creation." Ignatiy Vishnevetsky of The A.V. Club criticized the way the sci-fi, near the end, veered off course from being a "film of ideas" by "taking an arbitrary left turn into the territory of corny slasher thrillers": "While Ex Machina’s ending isn’t unmotivated [...], it does fracture much of what’s special about the movie. Up until the final scenes, Garland creates and sustains a credible atmosphere of unease and scientific speculation, defined by color-coded production design [...] and a tiny, capable cast." Steve Dalton from The Hollywood Reporter stated, "The story ends in a muddled rush, leaving many unanswered questions. Like a newly launched high-end smartphone, Ex Machina looks cool and sleek, but ultimately proves flimsy and underpowered. Still, for dystopian future-shock fans who can look beyond its basic design flaws, Garland’s feature debut functions just fine as superior pulp sci-fi."