The Machine
(2013)
(SPOILERS) The Machine
is an impressive Hollywood calling card from writer-director Caradog W James,
but only in respect of the latter skillset. There’s little original in his well-worn
script concerning an AI created by everybody’s favourite Bond villain Toby Stephens. Actually, James also steals a whole lot
in terms of visuals. But this is a stylishly put together futuristic thriller,
making the most of its low budget. So much so, it’s easy to give the scrappy
plotting and rote characterisation a pass, until the thought crosses your mind
that James may genuinely think he’s saying something profound or significant.
He isn’t. This is economical B-movie making to an
appreciably high standard but sadly, and predictably, rather than using the
opportunity to explore its familiar but still resonant themes James chooses to
cut to the chase. Did he chop The Machine
down to 90 minutes from a more extensive storyline, or is the conceit of a Cold
War with China (announced on the opening subtitles) less an announcement of a thought-through
world than a glib homage to post-Escape
from New York dystopias? Probably the latter, but while much of the movie
consciously recalls ‘80s movie filmmaking, it’s crucially absent the sense of
humour and irreverence that marked out the likes of Trancers; cheerful knock-offs of the big blockbusters. James is
clearly using Blade Runner as a
yardstick in his visuals, along with a host of other Hollywood visualists from
Lucas to Cameron, although the machine consciousness angle is more inspired by
other AI movies (2001, even Robocop). Crucially, a being’s discovery of self-awareness isn’t
interrogated in Ridley Scott’s classic; it’s all after the fact (Rachel is self-aware, she just isn’t aware
she’s a replicant). The main hat doffing to Blade
Runner here comes with the Turing Test, or Voight-Kampff for short, and
references to Skin Jobs
Stephens, a very English British actor who never seems quite
able to disentangle himself from natural starch, is scientist Vincent, employed
by the Ministry of Defence to develop an android for military purposes. He has
been testing his work on damaged veterans, some amputees, others severely brain
damaged. Many of these individuals guard
the research facility, possessing implants that render them mute aside from
incomprehensible (to others) interactions with each other. Vincent is driven by
the desire to find a treatment for his afflicted daughter, and when Ava (Caity
Lotz) joins the project it looks as if a breakthrough will be possible. But
Thomson (Dennis Lawson), the commander of the base, is ruthless in pursuing the
goal of a weaponised machine and will not let anything as flimsy as ethics
stand in his way.
James’ movie is big on atmosphere but short on depth. He
starts things off effectively, with as mentioned, a scene that mimics Blade Runner as a newly implanted
soldier fails to show he is sufficiently human and takes to Vincent and his
assistant with a scalpel. The cinematography of Nicolai Bruel here, and
throughout, is a major boon to James, even if he rather overdoes the lighting
rigs and lens flares in order to divert attention from the threadbare sets (it
appears that they filmed on a disused industrial site). Much of this will seem familiar, from the
glowing eyes of the implantees to their Ben Burtt-esque verbal communications
(actually Farsi). The physical effects, also aided by lighting, are mostly
impressive; prosthetic arms and android endoskeletons. The synth score too,
from Tom Raybould, adds enormously to the mood.
But the characters are a clutch of clichés. Vincent is the
single-minded yet sympathetic scientist (he needs the daughter sub-plot to make
him sufficiently relatable). Thomson is utterly loathsome, doing thoroughly
nasty things just because he can. Lotz barely gets a look in as Ava, but she
gives a good performance as the sexy android version. Like most of the content
here, it isn’t what’s on the page so much as the realisation that makes it
worth a look. Lotz conveys the android’s growing awareness and childlike
innocence well, but the devices used are predictable (a fear of clowns, her
manipulation by Thomson; “That man killed
your mother”). The AI’s suggestion that an android could be used to infiltrate
and assassinate the Chinese leader is remarked upon by Thomson as a good idea
but surely that would be one of the first things he’d have considered? And just
what did he expect Vincent to be working on, such that as soon as the project
is successful he wants the results curtailed (“Conscious machines are the last thing we need. Have you any idea how
dangerous that would be?... The technologically advance tribe always wins”).
Besides the AI aspect, there’s a touch of Splice to the creature that falls for
her creator, but James doesn’t is only skin-deep in his exploration of his Skin
Job. A physical relationship is presumably not feasible, and the plot quickly
settles on a base-wide revolt for its action-focused third act. Which is decently
realised, but underlines that this is not the most thoughtful of movies. It serves
to render the would-be provocative last scene, in which the downloaded
consciousness of Vincent’s now deceased daughter would rather interact with her
new “mother” than her old father, flat. So what? And all the portentous talk of
the machines being part of the “new world”
lacks a crum of achievability. An android and a motley assortment of cyborgs
are somehow going to inherit the Earth? How? Perhaps in a nebulous sense, over
the course of centuries.
In the best of both worlds this would be smart and flashy,
but we just have to make do with flashy. The
Machine momentarily puts its brain first whenever its director wheels out
the Turing Test, but he can’t sustain that edge. Still, if James can produce
this kind of ‘80s-future chic with less than £1m, it will be more than worthwhile
investigating what he is capable of when equipped with a decent budget and
someone else’s script.
***
