Post by klep on Oct 30, 2017 6:47:29 GMT -6
MOVIE OF THE WEEK for 10/30: A.I. Artificial Intelligence
"I am. I was" - Gigolo Joe
In the 1970s, Stanley Kubrick purchased the rights to a short story by Brian Aldiss called "Supertoys Last All Summer Long". He probably didn't expect that development of the story would take over two decades, and not be complete until after his passing. The project would ultimately pass into the hands of Stephen Spielberg's, who later on in the process worked closely with Kubrick to bring the story to the screen.
A.I. Artificial Intelligence is a movie about some pretty big questions. It opens with Dr. Hobby (William Hurt) pontificating about the state of robotic development, and wanting to go to the next stey - creating a robot that can love, and be loved in return. Not wasting time, the film quickly moves to the placement of new robot David (Haley Joel Osmont) with Henry & Monica Swinton (Sam Robards and Frances O'Connor). As time goes by, Monica and David grow closer, but tragic circumstances force Monica to abandon David in the woods lest he be destroyed. Distraught, David decides that if he could only become a real boy - like Pinocchio - he would finally truly earn his mother's love.
The film thus grapples with the question of when something becomes alive, one of the grandest themes of science fiction. The other robots David meets in his journey (most notably Jude Law's Gigolo Joe) all have varying degrees of sentience, but still have some self-awareness and desires - even if said desires are a direct result of their programming. Humanity treat them like slaves and toys - the Flesh Fair sequence making a particularly apt and ugly allegory for nativist anti-immigrant sentiment - but we're led from the beginning to see little difference between humans and their creations. Even in Hobby's opening speech it's a surprise when he reveals that one of the women in the room is actually a robot.
Kubrick was undoubtedly attracted to this grand idea of the border between life and unlife, but it's also not surprising he felt the story was better suited to Spielberg. For all his skill, Kubrick was a relatively cool and detached filmmaker, and a story with such open and genuine sentiment at its heart was definitely right up Spielberg's ally. David's love and longing for his mommy is so true, so pure that it's actually hard to imagine someone better suited to it than Spielberg.
The film is sometimes maligned for its multiple endings - with many erroneously accusing Spielberg of tacking on a mushy happy ending. But to my mind both are critically important. At the beginning of the film Hobby wanted to create a robot that could love, but he was challenged as to whether a human could love a robot in return. In the first ending, we see that Hobby succeeded in the first part. But it takes the second ending to show he succeeded at the second part as well. While humanity is long-gone in the second ending's far-off future, we're still shown a moment of redemption for our failures.
OUR NEXT MOVIE OF THE WEEK for 11/6: Double Indemnity
FIRST WEEK OF NOIRVEMBER!
For our first film of our celebration of film noir, we're going with this talent-packed adaptation of James M. Cain's acclaimed novel Double Indemnity. Directed by Billy Wilder and starring Fred MacMurray and Barbara Stanwyck, this brilliant film has become one of the classics not just of noir, but of cinema as a whole. Double Indemnity is available for rent on Amazon Video, though it is not free for Prime members.
NEXT PICTURE SHOW PODCAST for 10/31: The Graduate
Next week the Next Picture Show Podcast takes a look at Dustin Hoffman playing two sides of the same coin with The Graduate and the new The Meyerowitz Stories. We'll have a thread on Wednesday for the older film. The Graduate is available on Filmstruck's Criterion channel and for rent on Amazon Video, where it is free for Prime members with a Tribeca Shortlist add-on.
"I am. I was" - Gigolo Joe
In the 1970s, Stanley Kubrick purchased the rights to a short story by Brian Aldiss called "Supertoys Last All Summer Long". He probably didn't expect that development of the story would take over two decades, and not be complete until after his passing. The project would ultimately pass into the hands of Stephen Spielberg's, who later on in the process worked closely with Kubrick to bring the story to the screen.
A.I. Artificial Intelligence is a movie about some pretty big questions. It opens with Dr. Hobby (William Hurt) pontificating about the state of robotic development, and wanting to go to the next stey - creating a robot that can love, and be loved in return. Not wasting time, the film quickly moves to the placement of new robot David (Haley Joel Osmont) with Henry & Monica Swinton (Sam Robards and Frances O'Connor). As time goes by, Monica and David grow closer, but tragic circumstances force Monica to abandon David in the woods lest he be destroyed. Distraught, David decides that if he could only become a real boy - like Pinocchio - he would finally truly earn his mother's love.
The film thus grapples with the question of when something becomes alive, one of the grandest themes of science fiction. The other robots David meets in his journey (most notably Jude Law's Gigolo Joe) all have varying degrees of sentience, but still have some self-awareness and desires - even if said desires are a direct result of their programming. Humanity treat them like slaves and toys - the Flesh Fair sequence making a particularly apt and ugly allegory for nativist anti-immigrant sentiment - but we're led from the beginning to see little difference between humans and their creations. Even in Hobby's opening speech it's a surprise when he reveals that one of the women in the room is actually a robot.
Kubrick was undoubtedly attracted to this grand idea of the border between life and unlife, but it's also not surprising he felt the story was better suited to Spielberg. For all his skill, Kubrick was a relatively cool and detached filmmaker, and a story with such open and genuine sentiment at its heart was definitely right up Spielberg's ally. David's love and longing for his mommy is so true, so pure that it's actually hard to imagine someone better suited to it than Spielberg.
The film is sometimes maligned for its multiple endings - with many erroneously accusing Spielberg of tacking on a mushy happy ending. But to my mind both are critically important. At the beginning of the film Hobby wanted to create a robot that could love, but he was challenged as to whether a human could love a robot in return. In the first ending, we see that Hobby succeeded in the first part. But it takes the second ending to show he succeeded at the second part as well. While humanity is long-gone in the second ending's far-off future, we're still shown a moment of redemption for our failures.
OUR NEXT MOVIE OF THE WEEK for 11/6: Double Indemnity
FIRST WEEK OF NOIRVEMBER!
For our first film of our celebration of film noir, we're going with this talent-packed adaptation of James M. Cain's acclaimed novel Double Indemnity. Directed by Billy Wilder and starring Fred MacMurray and Barbara Stanwyck, this brilliant film has become one of the classics not just of noir, but of cinema as a whole. Double Indemnity is available for rent on Amazon Video, though it is not free for Prime members.
NEXT PICTURE SHOW PODCAST for 10/31: The Graduate
Next week the Next Picture Show Podcast takes a look at Dustin Hoffman playing two sides of the same coin with The Graduate and the new The Meyerowitz Stories. We'll have a thread on Wednesday for the older film. The Graduate is available on Filmstruck's Criterion channel and for rent on Amazon Video, where it is free for Prime members with a Tribeca Shortlist add-on.