A.I. Artificial Intelligence: A Program Lost in a Fairy Tale

I remember the first time I had watched Steven Speilberg's 2001 film, A.I. Artificial Intelligence, many years ago, around the time it came out in theatres. I came out of the film not liking it that much mainly because it left me in a state of melancholy. I guess you could say that the film ended, "Happily ever after," but, even at a young age, I looked at it with much more cynicism. The robot suffered through so much to obtain the love of his mother yet only is able to receive one day of happiness, or 'happiness.' This melancholy that I felt I think is the core of this film's narrative and emotional power. It is drawn from the uneasiness of the main character who may or may not be acting on feelings and rationality but by the next line of code in its program. Roger Ebert began his thoughtful Great Movies essay on the film with the launchpad for my exploration into the film:

David has been programmed to love. Once he is activated with a code, he fixes on the activator, in this case his Mommy (Frances O'Connor). He exists to love her and be loved by her. Because he is a very sophisticated android indeed, there's a natural tendency for us to believe him on that level. In fact he does not love and does not feel love; he simply reflects his coding.

The idea that David, played incredibly by Haley Joel Osment, is an android who  may or may not be becoming more human in this age-old fairy tale illuminates the depth of Spielberg's film, a film that upon reviewing after all these years, I have come to the realization of its majesty and its mysteriousness. the focal point being David's human obscurity. Retrospectively, Artificial Intelligence is one of Spielberg's most ambitious projects in the last fifteen years. It does not sidestep ambiguity but at the same time does not ignore convention (it is loosely based on Pinocchio after all). The film blends both together to guide us through a familiar narrative executed in an unfamiliar way. Osment's subtleties in his performance grant us a consistency in this form.

Take note, for example, the scene in which the mom abandons him, his mother has both of her arms on his shoulders, crying as she tell him about the failed relationship. David first looks blankly, for a moment we wonder if he will even process this situation. Then, like clockwork, he begins to panic, as if the program executed has followed the most logical path surmised by the situation at hand. This is just one of a series of uncanny events, and I use the word 'uncanny' to evoke the phenomenon in artificial intelligence, between David and his family, who adopt him (in a sense) in the absence of their devastatingly ill son in a coma.

Spielberg's longtime cinematographer and one of the best in the business, Janusz Kaminski, curiously explores David's face and especially his eyes along with isolating him even upon making a connection with his family. David doesn't blink; his eyes processes every little thing he sees his human parents do. At the dinner table, when David laughs explosively upon seeing food on his mother's face, it is done so with the effect that he is not actually laughing but because that is the next logical step in the situation, to an extent. It is as if David totally disregarded tone, volume, and brevity of his laugh. Of course, this is early in the film, but it certainly begs the question of David's, well, existence. His adoptive parents have no understanding how how to react, the same goes for the audience.

Nothing, during this first act, expresses any sort of deep, emotional connection between David and his family. David only begins loving after a series of code is essentially executed by his mother and after that David bases his actions around loving or, more specifically, loving his mother. His love for others is only attributed to the way in which his mother loves them. In the scene directly after the pool incident, the mother looks through some colorful letters written by David always addressed to her. Each one states that he loves her but the variable is who else he loves or who else he considers to be part of the family. Sometimes he doesn't even mention the father or Martin, other times it is at the expense of Teddy (a teddy bear I feel is a lot smarter than anyone imagines). Granted, it is written in a manner that is similar to how most kids express themselves early on, but if we regard David for what he is, then it becomes problematic since the focus of his expression and of his love is only from the mother. If the father and Martin were not there, they would be disregarded.

This first 'family' act of the film, shot with purity and soft lighting, illustrates an interruption of human normality with the continuous existence of artificial intelligence. Though the world, in this case the house, David inhabits is essentially as sterile and clean as he himself (note how featureless his face is), the function of human beings is far more dynamic, complex, and chaotic to grasp. David fits with the environment because he resembles this futuristic, sterile look as does the furniture and decor. The void between the organic and the mechanic is that uncanny valley in which humans can never fully regard AI because of difference in perception of reality. One sees it in constant flux with feelings and emotions as part of the whole sense perception. The other sees it in a logical algorithmic matrix. When David grabs Martin and drags him into the pool after being poked by a knife (even when the kid with the knife said he was not going to hurt him), there is almost a blatant ignorance of anyone who is not mommy. Martin becomes an object in the programming function that may allow David to protect himself himself from what he perceives as danger. Then, when he is left by his mother, the algorithms change to reflect the person he is dealing with, the object of his love. After this, we never see David again with his family. The experiment is over, now the AI must confront the world. This is where artificiality and, to some extent, intelligence, begins to obscure.

But, this is also where the most crucial part of the story begins and its origins come from the first act with the family and that is the telling of the fairy tale of Pinocchio. David encompasses himself with a goal and proceeds to make the goal possible. Now, this sort of ambition signals some hints of what some people call rationality and something that can be tied to human function. Again, though, this goal is constructed out of the one task he was to do. Nevertheless, David has equated this fairly tale with a mission of becoming more human in real life. Another way of looking at it is that David's attempt to comprehend a situation that he couldn't before is done so with with help of a fairy tale (and it is intriguing to note that this element of the narrative coincides with the focal point of a more recent film).

The second act, the adventure, so to speak, is one that illustrates this rational David as he takes the best step to achieving his goal. It is also a showcase presented to David about his own identity, as a 'mecha' instead of an 'orga' as well as his own notion of being, which is depicted in the flesh fair sequence. This unsettling sequence reverberates over many different perceptions. In terms of Spielberg and his body of work (see Raiders of the Lost Ark, Schindler's List, and Munich) one could loosely equate this event to the systematic killing of Jews during the Holocaust (yes, I know that seems like a stretch, but echoes of it, I feel, are still felt because I feel Spielberg bases much of these sorts atrocities on the Holocaust). Metaphor or not, the flesh fair's impudent display of torture towards entities all humans participating think are not alive suggests an unabridged hatred towards the rise of artificial intelligence. The scene gives us an expose of androids of all shapes and sizes, offering many interesting insights as to the diversity of artificial intelligence. They all have their own personality traits, one is a maid, another seems to reflect the character of Buck Turgidson (an observation I'll get to later). David witnesses the deaths of many and equates it with the possibility of his own death and when the time comes for his turn, along with the Gigolo Joe, he pleads his life that he is not Pinocchio, which is the tale that is rooted in his goal to reattain his mother's love. Once again, David equates his existence with his task though this time it moves people enough to let him and Joe go free.

Yet again, David is practicing rationality to an extent. One of the audience members shouted out that AI don't beg for their lives. Though there was one other bot who fought and stated that he could still work, it wasn't in desperation that he is going to die but that he could not perform his duties. Through this, David is saved as well as Joe and they embark on a journey to find the blue fairy, essentially a symbol that will achieve David's goal. It is worth noting that Joe really only helps him because the mention of the 'blue fairy' has him equate this terminology to woman and since sex is his trade he equates his trade to helpfulness towards David's quest, most likely thinking David wants to actually get with a woman. This leads them to Rouge City, a landscape of phallic symbols and lusty ambiance. It is a cityscape of sensory overload, a far cry from the sterile interiors of the family home. Despite this, David remains fixated on finding Dr. Know, who could lead him to the blue fairy. Besides the plot advancement the scene with Dr. Know provides, there is significant insight that I will elaborate on later occurring within this scene. The only way David is able to find the question and the answer he is looking for is to combine fact and fiction/fantasy or, to put it in a slightly different but crucial manner, to suspend rational beliefs and allow the belief of the unbelievable to determine judgement and action. Of course, the rationality David exhibits, as stated earlier, is the projection of his pragmatic desire to return to his mother. Again, you can ask yourself, does he really think he is combining fact and fiction or does has he attributed this story to be an exact and realistic possibility?

His eagerness to go to Manhattan, or as it is referred to, "The End of the World," worries Joe ("There's a reason why they call it, 'MANhattan.'") in which he then professes his perceptible fear of orgas, a ironclad separation of identities. Here, Joe unfolds his conclusions to David in robotic austerity:

JOE
Wait! What if the blue fairy isn't real at all, David? What
if she's magic? The supernatural is the hidden web that
unites the universe. Only orga believe what cannot be seen
or measured. It is that oddness that separates our species.
Or what if the Blue Fairy is an electronic parasite that has
arisen to hold the minds of artificial intelligence? They
hate us, you know? The humans...They'll stop at nothing. 

DAVID
My Mommy doesn't hate me! Because I'm special, and...unique!
Because there has never been anyone like me before! Ever!
Mommy loves Martin because he is real and when I am real,
Mommy's going to read to me, and tuck me in my bed, and sing
to me, and listen to what I say, and she will cuddle with
me, and tell me every day a hundred times a day that she
loves me!

Joe understand that there is this unseen force that influences humans in many ways and understands that this force is immeasurable for androids. It is intriguing he labels it as an oddness, for it is the oddities of artificial intelligence that obscures our symbiotic relationship, or attempt thereof, with an android. David responds by outlining his whole program, and with moderate menace, lists all the nice things his mommy will do for him when he is real. As Joe retorts, maintaining his austerity, it is worth noting the lighting of David's reaction shot (pictured below) which echoes the first shot of David in the film (the first picture up top). The overexposed light seems to surround David and swallow some of his face. This visual motif is the illustration of a conflicted identity and a projection of our hesitation to understand him as an android becoming more human.

The third act begins when David and Joe arrive at Manhattan, a beautiful tragedy of a city submerged in water. The film becomes more reflective and contemplative as David discovers the hollowness of his existence. There is a certain barrenness or loneliness that is expressed in the city, one that captures David as he makes one discovery after another about his futile uniqueness. John Williams's score provides a creeping shrill to highlight such revelations. David initiates a sort of dismantling of his program, his mission, as he finds out about his many existences. Professor Hobby, the creator of these child robots, explains to David that he is unique because of his experiences. He provides what seems to be existential reasoning to justify David's revelations but, as we hark back to doubt, could David even perceive such an identity based on experience, does he equate his adventure with himself and his growth? What transpires is a negation to Prof. Hobby's justifications. What he can see, what is measurable, is what counts for David, so much that his dismantling of his program seems logical. Only if David is unique will he be able to become a real boy so that mommy can love him else, he cannot become a real boy. It is worth noting during these scenes the use of makeup. David looks far more weathered and, well, human than his plastic counterparts, symbolic of his experiences. Though we can make this visual difference and equate it to a compelling adventure, David cannot. So he goes outside and sits high up on the edge of the skyscraper eventually throwing himself off. In a delicate shot, we see the reflection of David's fall off the aircraft's window from where Joe is watching. David acts as a tear on Joe's face.

This sublime imagery is hard to really flesh out verbally. And, frankly, I did not catch this until I scanned the internet for analyses and found this site. What makes this shot so remarkable are the layers of perception it gives. Joe witnesses what seems to be the self-destruction of a mecha existence. Yet, is he really feeling pain for David because from his perspective we know he is just seeing the boy fall; we as the audience see this superimposition. Could he be sad? To an extent yes, considering what he feels in terms of mecha existence in relation to humanity as expressed in the scene following Dr. Know. At the same time, could he extract the notions of David's situation and apply it to himself in a way that does instigate sadness? This ambiguity is further emphasized by the clearer fact that it is not a real tear falling from his eyes but a reflection of a mecha. In a way, this shot composes two integral parts of the problem artificial intelligence faces, to understand their existence and understand themselves. There is a fragility here, experienced firsthand by these androids whether they know it or not, that transcends these characters within this story because, think about it, aren't the problems they face the same as ours?

What culminates is an ending that was and still is controversial in the eyes of many viewers. Conflicted moviegoers attack its indecisiveness in aesthetic practice, an indecisiveness that is attributed to the fact that this was originally Stanley Kubrick's story but was later transformed under the lens of Steven Spielberg. This transformation, some say, made the ending tacky, forcing a sentimentality that didn't need to be there. Honestly, I can see some justification since the previous scenes seemed so dark, but it is the coalescence of the biggest part of the film, the connection between orga and mecha. The moment David saw the blue fairy in the amusement park, his goal materialized once again within his framework. The program rebooted and David sought after his goal, doing an inhuman thing and remaining with the blue fairy for 2,000 years. Once again, David is lost in the fairy tale.

Note the use of the reflection again, this time, although there are some similarities with this and the tear, it is directed more towards the conflict between fact and fantasy. The fantasy of the blue fairy (her face, specifically) superimposed by the flat fact of David's (artificial) existence. This can be coupled, through this same shot, the conflict between the fact of true, human emotions and the fantasy of artificial, android emotions. A human, starting from a certain age, and certainly the age David is suppose to be, could identify this fairy as fake. David has no line in his code to acquire such information. And so for 2,000 years he remains in hopes of his transformation. He gets it, but in a manner that is quite unlike what he probably expected. In two millenia, artificial intelligence is the only sentient being on Earth, an Earth that is a frozen wasteland. It seems like this highly advanced and evolved AI has initiated an excavating project as the camera follows an abstract aircraft into winding tunnels. They have found David, Teddy, and the blue fairy. David and Teddy are frozen; David's eyes still fixated on the fairy. Yet later, upon his touch, the fairy shatters. The advanced AI has other plans.

The whole simulation of David's wish (i.e. the final scene), to understand it fully and to begin to realize its lack of sentimentality, is first and foremost a research project conducted by the advanced AI. They want to observe a living human. Granting the wish for David benefits the AI for their project, it just also benefits David at the same time. Even the AI acknowledge the brevity of an occasion that David would want forever. So we return to the sterile house from the beginning. This time, it is filled with shadow, almost as if the simulation, taken from David's memory, is disintegrating in depiction and accuracy. When David finally sees mommy, it is in a shot that, at first glance, doesn't reflect the way mommy first saw David, but it shares one huge aesthetic quality. In the shot, instead of being shrouded in light, mommy is covered in sheets, far more gentler, yet hinting at some sort of disconnect (as well as maybe some Freudian significance, but that is definitely not the topic I wish to discuss).

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The perfect day flows blissfully and dreamlike. We return to the overexposed lighting, which protrudes from the outside, making us wonder what really is outside since it is certainly not the familiar, defrosted Earth. David is continuously happy, his program has finally executed its steps and has achieved its goal, there is no room for any other feeling because David is fulfilling his duty. So when David falls to sleep, never to see his mommy again, there is peace with him. Many people leave it at that and it is not a wrong or bad way to perceive it but there is still more that can be discussed by how this film ends. Looking at it a different way, let us return to Roger Ebert's essay:

Of course we must ask in what sense Monica is really there. The filmmaker Jamie Stuart informs me she is not there at all; that an illusion has merely been implanted in David's mind, and that the concluding scenes take place entirely within David's point of view. Having downloaded all of David's memories and knowledge, the new mechas have no further use for him, but provide him a final day of satisfaction before terminating him. At the end, when we are told he is dreaming, that is only David's impression. Earlier in the film, it was established that he could not sleep or therefore dream.

 I agree, and look at it this way too: if you still think David became a real boy and actually started dreaming, then what good would this transformation be if there are no other humans. In other words, what does David have to live for now that his one and only time of seeing his mommy is over? Years ago I felt that anguish but only connected it to the eeriness of the situation, the physical and temporal distance David had with all the other characters, like his mother. Now, I have come to feel a more specific sadness. A goal unknowingly failed (well, unknowingly is not the best word, I could sense David grasping the brief encounter, but nevermind that) and a chance long gone. His mother gone forever, David will never be a real boy.

Or is he? I mean, he did shed a tear right before his mother went back to her eternal sleep.

I conclude this essay with the paramount expression of a film I have long ignored and considered eccentrically unappealing. The film's themes and visuals have a sort of articulation that can only spawn with the combination of two of the greatest filmmakers in the history of cinema. I feel it extends far beyond its eccentricities. In fact, this oddness helps create the world of the film and establish the fundamental conflict within the film: Our relationship to artificial intelligence. Through this, the film asks the audience to invest in it far more than most films. Throughout this extensive essay I have explained at what points the film David could be acting on 'human' notions but may as well be acting through a program. Yet, I will not decisively announce that there is no humanity in David. No, that is for each viewer to decide.

See, the problem of artificial intelligence is our perception of its existence. It is up to the individual to decide how much credence they should uphold as they gaze upon a humanoid being. Moreover, it is up to the individual to decide the magnitude of humanity they project on the humanoid. Similar to a toy (aka Pinocchio) and a pet. Yet, what differentiates those two is, for one, pets are organic, but, two, there is no sense of the uncanny because they don't resemble humans. So it is up to each viewer to decide how much humanity they project on David as he goes through his fairy tale adventure. Do you feel his pain, his abandonment, his loneliness?

To put in a larger perspective, consider the film Blade Runner, which has nearly human robots called replicants rebelling against a decaying human race to prolong their brief lifespans. The replicants in this film exhibit their own sense of humanity or their lack of humanity; some of the characters progress and show authentic emotion while others digress into plastic artificiality. They are their own agents. In Artificial Intelligence, there is no such agency or, probably more accurate, such agency is far more ambiguous. Through the tediously amazing makeup and acting, we observe the strangeness that David expresses and we are always left to wonder how authentic and organic his feelings are. As a viewer, we can choose how much faith we put into David's pursuit of humanity. If we feel the emotions David is feeling or should be feeling, then there is a good enough reason to say that he is becoming more human because we can forgo his oddities and identify with his strife. It is the same reason why David's mommy did not terminate him and why the crowd in the flesh fair did not want to kill him, their quantity of humanity applied to a mecha swayed their perception of David. But, again, this discretion that arises is the problem of artificial intelligence the film so brilliantly illustrates. In the future, when artificial intelligence becomes so advanced that it does exhibit human-like qualities, how are we to judge them and to interact with them and how do we place our own human existence within this growing context?

Yet, like all great science fiction films, Artificial Intelligence and its focus on the android say a lot about us, humans, than we think. Science fiction can defamiliarize the familiar by taking it out of present-day, realistic setting and placing it in a time that is unfamiliar. The strangeness of the times and of the technology is always another way of looking at ourselves and what we struggle with. This film does it most eloquently with David and Joe. Even though they are mecha and have their own struggles because of that, their struggle for normality, for understanding is not foreign to humans. The motivational reason that we can begin to apply any feelings on David through his journey is because, from the start, his idealization of a fairy tale is so familiar to how we cope with the absurdity we face in our everyday lives. For those who say that David eventually becomes human in the end are not wrong at all, they are expressing a human desire of peace and normality that they apply to the main character because our familiarity with a struggle for love cannot be faked. And it is love that is the driving feeling for David, whether it is just from his program or not. In the film's universe, love seems like it is hard to receive and give: Mommy and daddy cannot love their ill while having a hard time loving David, Professor Hobby lost his son and is denied such love and, thus, goes on to create the many Davids, Joe's occupation as a mecha is to give love to women who cannot receive it from human males, and of course David's search for a mother's love.

I realize now how much I missed when I first watched Artificial Intelligence and I am happy to have come back to it. It is a dense narrative with lush visuals that only add to such density. Ambiguity acts somewhat as a self-evaluation of how we understand our own feelings as we are taken on this magical adventure. I feel this film is one of those films many people have seen but only a long time ago. I also feel that this film is well worth returning to.