Stephen Spielberg and Stanley Kubrick may have one thing in common. They are both highly respected and acclaimed directors. But their filmographies couldn’t be more different: Spielberg has Jaws, ET and Raiders Of The Lost Ark while Kubrick has 2001: A Space Odyssey, Full Metal Jacket and The Shining. But then somehow a film like A.I. Artificial Intelligence comes along.
It was released in 2001 and directed by Spielberg, based on a short story called Supertoys Last All Summer Long by Brian Aldiss. A.I. seemed to have spent many years being a passion project of Kubrick’s, but due to technology not being where he would have liked it to be, he wound up giving it to Spielberg who mostly made the film his own. Spielberg did try to honour the creative vision of Kubrick where he could, even going as far as dedicating the film to him. A.I. feels like a hybrid that tries to put the styles of two very different people on display, which could go either way.
The plot follows a boy android named David (Haley Joel Osment) who has the capability to feel love. He is given to the Swinton family who have a son named Martin (Jake Thomas) who is in suspended animation due to an unknown illness. The mother of the family, Monica (Frances O’ Connor), takes some time getting used to David but just as she starts to like him Martin is suddenly well again and quickly grows jealous of David. This leads Monica to reluctantly abandon him. He then goes on a quest to be turned from a robot into a real boy, hoping that will be enough to make Monica love him again, meeting other robots like himself along the way and eventually making friends with a one named Joe (Jude Law).
I don’t know how you play a robot that looks like a child, but safe to say whatever Osment does it works. When he first appears he obviously sounds very innocent and naïve, barely saying anything and doing a lot of watching and copying the people around him. There is definitely a sense of progression in the performance where he stops acting like a robot and more like a person. I know it’s how you’d expect things to develop but it’s still good work regardless of that. Law is also effective as Joe. He works well with Osment and plays the role of a foil to David very well as he knows how robots like him and David are viewed by humans. He brings a respectable degree of personality to the role complete with mimicking the movements of famous dancers from the Hollywood golden age like Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly. A lot of the portrayals of humans do feel very one-note; O’ Connor and Thomas as Monica and Martin seem to be doing their best with what they’ve been given but I don’t think the material is doing that much for them. At least they do better than Sam Robards as Henry (the husband and father of the family) who unless he’s on screen feels easy to forget about. Brendan Gleeson shows up in a role that could have been filled by anyone. But for what little screen time he has, William Hurt gives a memorable performance as Professor Allen Hobby, David’s creator. Chris Rock makes a brief cameo as a robot which definitely seems like a Spielberg move rather than a Kubrick one.
Ben Kingsley narrates at certain points throughout the film and for what it’s worth he has a voice that’s well suited for narration. But he’s used very sparingly which seems a bit of a waste – he should have been made a bigger part of the film or not involved in it all. I have somewhat mixed feelings on his inclusion.
I will admit that I did like Teddy – a creation of Stan Winston who could move in real time with Osment. However it was twenty years ago and the CGI is not very impressive. Maybe Jack Angel’s voice got a bit too robotic and rough to be believable as a teddy bear for a child but I don’t think that diminishes the quality of work that was put into the character.
Given that this film was in production since the 1970s it doubtless had multiple treatments and writers. The ones credited with the final product seem to be Ian Watson for the screen story and Spielberg as the screenwriter. The first half is apparently the more faithful to the source material and is fairly strong, but it dips in quality and then does what it can to try and pick up again. It doesn’t, despite its best efforts. The pacing drags and in the middle there are some scenes that go on longer then they have to. There is a very prolonged sequence at a so-called ‘Flesh Fair’ where old robots are destroyed for the pleasure of humans. That seems like something Kubrick might have included – but then again, it’s made to look like a carnival which feels more like Spielberg. The tone can be a little inconsistent, changing from dark science fiction film to contemplating questions like what it means to be human (in not-so-subtle fashion). The notion of David wanting to be a real boy is the closest thing we get to a running theme and is obviously inspired by Pinocchio, to the extent that David hears the Pinocchio story being read out and believes that a part of the journey to become human involves finding a blue fairy.
I know the ending has provoked much negative comment but I’m not sure what all the complaining is about. It’s not a conventional ending, certainly not for a Spielberg sci-fi film. It’s not over-optimistic like Spielberg or dripping in misery like Kubrick. But I think it’s not such a bad way to end a film.
I can’t say much for Janusz Kamiński’s cinematography, but what I can say is that this film has a great deal of strong lighting and glare, to the extent that certain characters including David himself seem to be sweating. Maybe I’m finally starting to notice the apparent obsession Spielberg has with spotlights. I’m sure he tried to make his vision of the future interesting to look at, but it’s hard to appreciate it with all those lights. There are some apparent attempts to direct the way Kubrick would, but I don’t think you would notice much if you weren’t wise to it.
A.I. had a lot of potential and while it undoubtedly lived up to it in some ways, in others It didn’t. It’s not bad by any means but it’s also far from perfect. Osment is certainly the main reason to see this and if you can find the time to watch it, then go right ahead.
