7. Ex Machina (2014)
The genre of science fiction is at its finest when the story acts as a reflection of our world, the direction it is (believed to be) headed in and the moral questions that arise from there. One particular sci-fi theme that is endlessly written about is humankind's continuous thirst for scientific discovery and power and where we draw the line stating that humans have gone too far. Often in these stories, the line is posited based on some kind of eventual ramification from the innovation. For example, the effect of the discovery may tangibly lead to death/harm to people, the environment and/or the planet. To the audience, the question is then asked - have we gone too far? Where the scientific discovery concerns matters of 'life' the question is sometimes posited in a more existential or, even, religious way such as - have humans gone beyond the bounds of what God intended for us? This is a theme that I personally find fascinating and you will see that it crops up in my list more than once. The first case is in 2014's, Ex Machina.
Ex Machina was directed and written by Alex Garland. It was his directorial debut after having written a string of successful sci-fi films including 28 Days Later (2002), Sunshine (2007), Never Let Me Go (2010) and Dredd (2012).
Ex Machina is about a young programmer, Caleb (Domhall Gleeson), who wins a contest to visit one of the world's greatest scientific minds, Nathan Bateman (Oscar Isaac), an eccentric recluse who lives alone in his tech-y mansion in the mid-West. Upon his arrival, Caleb is told that Bateman is working on the world's first true-AI that he has stored in a female body named Ava (Alicia Vikander). Being a tech guy himself, Bateman tells Caleb that he was chosen to test out Ava's artificial intelligence using the Turing Test (a true scientific test developed in the 1950's by Alan Turing to test a machine's cognizance in relation to a human's). The film quickly becomes a tense thriller as Caleb begins forming a relationship with Ava through these tests that also soon lead to him questioning the true intentions of Bateman with Ava, as well as his motivations for bringing Caleb there. To go any further than this would be to ruin the fun of the film.
The film, like all great sci-fi, has an intelligent screenplay that poses the questions to the audience without becoming preachy or bogged-down in technical nonsense. Whereas many of the moralistic sci-fi films are slow to unravel, Ex Machina gains momentum early on and thereafter never loses steam. It was appropriately nominated for Best Original Screenplay at that year's Oscars.
Although the three leads had, at that point, been in a couple large films, Ex Machina was a definite turning point for all three. Isaac and Vikander, in particular, are absolutely stellar and Vikander went on to win a number of awards for her performance as Ava. Gleeson is also strong, however, his role simply calls for a subtler performance and more nuance. Lastly, the visual effects used for the melding of Vikander into Ava are astonishing and the film won Best Visual Effects at the Oscars.
Ex Machina takes all of the best elements of science fiction and throws them together into a very fine film. Should we, as humans, have the power to create other humans? What does it even mean to be human? These are the primary questions that one will ask themselves after watching the astounding, Ex Machina.
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