GED104: Science, Technology, and Society

FILM ANALYSIS 1
A.I. ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

Submitted by: FALEJO, PATRICIA B.

 The movie Artificial Intelligence, A.I. was directed by Steven Spielberg and was written

by Spielberg himself, Brian Aldiss, and Ian Watson. Jake Thomas played the role as Martin,

Frances O’ Connor as Monica, Sam Robards as Henry, Jude Law as Gigolo Joe, and for the main

protagonist David was portrayed by Young Haley Joel Osment.

David is a ‘mecha boy’ who was programmed with the purpose of child’s love towards its

mother and father. Henry, a Cybertronics employee, and his wife, Monica, was assigned as his

parents to test the capability of the boy robot in which David eventually learned the habits of being

a human. Henry and Monica’s son, after being in a coma, came back and resulted in a sort of

competition between him and David where he was left abandoned in a forest. There are robot

hunters, is what I like to call them, or known as The Flesh Fair in the movie that captured David

and Joe by caging them. They were at this circus-like setting wherein people watch robots get

wrecked as entertainment. Fortunately, they were able to escape; Joe and David eventually found

Professor Hobby’s place where they found multiple David look-alike. David jumped from the

skyscraper into the ocean where he saw the blue fairy but before he got close to the statue, Joe

saved him in an aircraft but Joes was captured by the electromagnet detecting him. David then

reached the blue fairy, continued wishing until he got frozen inside the aircraft. Fast forward to the

future, 2000 years has passed, humans have gone extinct and the Mechas continued to evolve, they

revived David and was able to reconstruct the memories David was able to keep.

I thought that the movie will just be like any other sci-fi movies based on the title. As I

continued watching, I realized that it is about the sole purpose of humans creating robot to serve a
purpose to the human world. They were created as products – which when abused can eventually

cause harm or in other terms, might backfire. This movie showed that us, humans, will seek for

more where Professor Hobby stated “to create an artificial being has been the dream of man since

the birth of science,”. Realistically, I find it hard for humans to coexist with robots to the point that

its near impossible because humans have the instincts to feel superior because they are alive in

terms of living or might feel inferior because they lack what robots can do.

The movie shows the lavish life of the people shown throughout the film where it can be

seen a lot of artificial beings roaming the world where the movie was set at. It was shown how far

can artificial intelligence can go on how they can resemble a human being. The editing and music

choices really add up to the emotions of the scenes, even the cinematography.

In conclusion, I think the film represents an ‘idea’ of what artificial beings can be, like how

David was created with the purpose of spreading love. For me personally, the movie lacks a

contribution to the bigger picture on what the movie is about or the theme. More like it was a

family adventure movie rather than the common Sci-fi movies we often see or watch.