Society has always had the need and the want or desire to play God throughout history of cinema (e.g. Frankenstein, Ex Machina). Of course like all of them, they are usually destined to be doomed. So for today’s film, I chose to watch the newest film in Artificial Intelligence entitled Morgan. Morgan (Anya Taylor Joy) is a new breed of artificial intelligence kind of humanoid that was breed as an organism by scientists as an experiment. One afternoon, Morgan has sort of a metal lapse and she attacks a scientist. The corporate company that is paying for the experiment decides that it wants to send in a risk-management consultant by the name of Lee Weathers (Kate Mara). Lee must decide whether Morgan is a valued asset or to terminate a dangerous asset. The film also stars Rose Leslie (The Last Witch Hunter) as Dr. Amy Menser, Michael Yare (Game Of Thrones) as Ted, Toby Jones (Captain America: The Winter Soldier) as Dr. Simon Ziegler, Chris Sullivan (Stranger Things) as Darren, Boyd Holbrook (Gone Girl) as Skip, Vinette Robinson (Sherlock) as Brenda, Michelle Yeoh (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) as Dr. Cheng, Jennifer Jason Leigh (The Hateful Eight) as Kathy, and the film was directed by Luke Scott (Loom).
The idea for the film was there and for the most part they did a fine job, but maybe the execution didn’t go off as planned. The first part of the film is kind of boring as it’s getting you up to speed with what is going on and exactly who Morgan is. The real excitement in my opinion is when Paul Giamatti shows up to test Morgan as to whether she is an asset for the company or not. That is when the intensity of the film really starts to build up because for a while all you get are pieces of a secret until that secret is finally revealed to you as to why she was locked in the box again. Giamatti is really just there to mess with her mind and prove that she in fact is not human and therefore is not capable of feeling real emotions. He is a ball buster and the only one who is going against science. I didn’t recognize Anna Taylor Joy until I saw that she was in the film The Witch. She was phenomenal in that film and she did a pretty good job in this one as well. One thing that I will say is that she was kind of freaky looking to me which might have been a very small aspect for what they were going for. The one thing I didn’t understand was what was the point of the character of Skip? He really doesn’t serve a real purpose in the film, but he’s just there. There’s a big twist at the end of the film, but if you do the math you’ll figure it out as soon as it happens. I saw the ending coming as soon as it started to unfold which doesn’t bother me too much, but they could have done better with that. Overall, it’s just an OK film that was looking to explore a different aspect of A.I. in cinema. I commend them for that, but it won’t change my grade this time. I am going to give the film an C+ for a final grade.
Believe it or not, I was never a huge fan of science fiction films growing up as a kid and in fact I preferred horror movies over them. With all the talk of a new Alien film, I figured what better time than now to see all the films in the franchise and start with the film Alien. A space merchant vessel known as the Nostromo is heading back to Earth after a routine pick up of whatever the cargo is. The crew is nice and asleep in their pods during the long and strenuous travel when they are awoken by MOTHER which is the ships computer. They discover that there is a distress signal from somewhere in space and protocol says that they have to investigate. After investigating the call, one of the crew members is attacked by something and they bring aboard a master alien specie that is takes no prisoners. The crew has to figure out a way to get safely home and away from the alien before it’s too late. The film stars Tom Skerritt (Top Gun) as Dallas, Sigourney Weaver (1492: Conquest Of Paradise) as Ripley, Veronica Cartwright (The Witches Of Eastwick) as Lambert, Harry Dean Stanton (The Green Mile) as Brett, John Hurt (Hellboy) as Kane, Ian Holm (The Fifth Element) as Ash, Yaphet Kotto (The Running Man) as Parker, Bolaji Badejo as the Alien, and the film was directed by Ridley Scott (Blade Runner).
So, I am happy to say that I was pleasantly surprised with how much I really liked the film. One thing I noticed about spaceships in space carrying humans and that is all of them are run by a computer that malfunctions. For example in 2001: A Space Odyssey, Hal 9000 runs the ship and basically kills everyone while MOTHER runs the ship in Alien and she’s not very helpful. Humans will never learn throughout time that we should never trust a computer. Nevertheless, the computer in this film is obviously the least of their troubles as they are being chased around and killed by an amazing H.R. Giger designed Alien. Now that is a pretty scary scenario if you ask me, but the beauty of the film wasn’t how much you saw the alien, it was where the hell was he. The film gave you that Jaws effect where you are wondering where on this creepy ship is that scary alien. When it’s time to go, they give you the alien on the ship. The film contained a small cast, but this cast is as brilliant as it gets with the likes of John Hurt, Harry Dean Stanton, etc. As I said above, I was never a huge fan of Sci-Fi films so I avoided watching these, but I am glad that I started because it has a brilliant story and sets. The cinematography and the editing of the film is also a strong point for the film. That is why I am going to give the film an A for a final grade.
365moviesin365dayschallenge 