THE MACHINE
Toby Stephens as Vincet / Caity Lotz as Ava/The Machine / Dennis Lawson as Thomson
Written and directed by Caradog W. James |
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Set in the
not-too-distant future, THE MACHINE imagines a world that has become
oppressed by the mighty hand of China, which has emerged as a superpower
nation, leaving the rest of the world to find ways of subverting them as a
global threat during this new Cold War. In the U.K. a brilliant computer scientist, Vincent (Toby
Stephens), has been working on a bold and ambitious plan to merge the
computer world with the human one; in other words, he wishes to perfect
the human brain and its capabilities with mechanized, A.I. enhanced
implants. The Ministry of Defense
- in hopes that Vincent's pioneering work will lead to more
lethal fighting men and women to combat China’s threat on the warfront -
funds his work. Secretly,
though, Vincent is using his radical and potentially revolutionary
research to save his dying daughter from a degenerative brain disease.
In the midst of
his research, Vincent is joined by Ava (Caity Lotz from TV’s ARROW),
another brilliant and determined computer scientist that expresses great
interest in Vincent’s work. Predictably,
Vincent and Ava’s partnership and combined work efforts begin to conflict
with the motives of the government that funds them, but during the midst
of all of this an accident befalls Ava, which eventually leads to Vincent
saving her, so to speak, by transforming her into “The Machine,” an
incredible artificially intelligent cyborg whose consciousness is
linked with her creator’s. In
many ways, the Machine is indeed lifelike and can pass as a human, but
emotionally lacks the nuances of what made Ava a human.
While Vincent struggles to fully understand his new creation and
find a cure for his sick daughter, the Ministry of Defense's executive
(Dennis Lawson) decides that he wants the Machine all to himself so that
he can exploit her as a killing machine on the warfront. Much like
TRANSCENDENCE, THE MACHINE ruminates on themes that are indeed kind of
ageless in the sci-fi genre, but James extrapolates much intrigue from them, and he does so without jeopardizing the film’s
more humanizing elements. The
nature of what is human and artificial consciousness is, obviously enough,
explored, but the film also comments on how modern society feels inexplicably
linked to computer technology in largely counter-intuitive and
destructive ways. The Machine
itself is kind of an intriguing creation, seeing as Vincent’s sentient
cyborg has potential to do good in a corrupt world, but is then corrupted
by evil and nefarious forces that wish to twist her essence for their own
immoral purposes. These
themes are then quite well tied into the subplot involving Vincent’s
desperate attempts to save his daughter’s life; he finds himself
sandwiched between the plights of both his natural offspring and the
mechanical being he created, which provides for much of the film’s
psychological grit and intrigue. Again, the
thematic material of THE MACHINE is hardly new or revitalizing for the
genre, but James has a manner of exploring and milking them to drum up just
the right evocation of dread and unease throughout.
Vincent, played in a cold and calculated performance by Stephens,
is perhaps a bit too ill-defined as a character to thoroughly root for (at
90 minutes, THE MACHINE does not provide much in the way of exposition or back-story),
but his troublesome plight and his ever-growing disillusionment with his
research helps ground us in the film and maintains our interest.
Caity Lotz has perhaps the trickier role (or should I say dual
role?) as the scientist that becomes an artificial being; she does a good
job of relaying the Machine’s almost childlike confusion of the world
around her while simultaneously showing her struggle with her very own
nature. What’s perhaps
most remarkable about the film is how James creates a well-realized
futuristic world with a budget that would barely cover the catering bills
on the TRANSCENDENCE set. With
stirring and ominous cinematography by Nicolai Bruel and a John Carpenter-ian
synthesized musical score by Tim Raybould, James crafts a vision of his
future world the feels rich with mysterious textures that helps to lure
you in right from the get-go. The
visual effects utilized in the film are also kind of thankless considering
the limited resources in the filmmaker’s hands, especially in film’s
shocking opening scene showing Vincent experimenting on a wounded solider
with brain implants. The
effects here rival, for what it's worth, just about anything found in a
large-scale studio feature film and, best of all, they rarely seem to draw
too much unwarranted attention to themselves.
THE MACHINE, alas, does stumble here and there, which kind of subverts it from becoming the truly mesmerizing corporeal thriller that it’s aspiring to be. As stated, Vincent remains a kind of vague cipher in the film and is perhaps a bit too distant and bitter in his demeanor to become a thoroughly intoxicating and likeable protagonist to latch on to (which is, no doubt, a direct result of the relative shortness of the film’s running time). That, and THE MACHINE stumbles into a third act and climax that – for as exemplarily orchestrated as it is - seems more interested in perfunctory gun battles and mayhem than with further exploring the film’s contemplative themes and characters. Still, THE MACHINE emerges as a surprising antidote for those that felt that TRANSCENDENCE failed to generate much curiosity regarding its similar ideas of the relationship between man and machine. THE MACHINE is a far smarter, thoughtful, and stylized sci-fi thriller than I was frankly expecting and director Caradog W. James has the goods of a natural and resourceful filmmaker. |
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