Review: Ex Machina

Alex Garland's work generally features a kind of meek, well-to-do character at the center who slowly begins to be forced to examine the darker parts of themselves. This theme is what has made so many of his stories so compelling. In 28 Days Later we saw the breakdown of normal society, in Sunshine we saw the breakdown of man himself. Similarly, Ex Machina focuses on the dangers of empathy, of the soft spots of humanity.

At an Internet megacorporation, a low-level programmer named Caleb (Gleeson) wins a company-wide lottery to spend a week with reclusive CEO Nathan (Isaac). This golden ticket gets you into a maximum-security compound. Nathan is friendly but always asserting his alpha-male status over Caleb. Nathan soon reveals the true purpose of Caleb’s visit: In a variation of the Turing test, Caleb will be the first outsider to interact with Ava (Vikander), a human-scaled and -shaped artificial intelligence built by Nathan, and will decide if he has created a true AI.

The film decides Caleb will be the central focus which is perhaps the only misstep the film makes. Isaac owns the movie with a truly remarkable performance and he is ten times more interesting than Gleeson is as Caleb.  He’s playing a brain who is part Mad Scientist and part Steve Jobs visionary. Vikander is the other standout as Ava. The seamless CGI creates a stunning character unlike anything seen before in films of this ilk. The film is on fire when either of these two are on screen. 

Garland’s film isn't some passive look into the future. It is and alert to the moral implications of our advancing technologies. He is asking questions of the present moment, reminding us that just because we can doesn't mean we should. With so many interesting and thrilling ideas, its curious the film's ending doesn't culminate to a bigger point. The final ideas feel underdeveloped but do let the audience ruminate on everything they have seen beforehand.

4/5