A capable cast and tantalising trailer for this Johnny Depp sci-fi film can't transcend Hollywood's digestible vision of the future
• More from the Week in geek series
• 2014 preview: sci-fi films to watch over the next 12 months
There seem to be two schools of thought in science fiction about artificial intelligence. The first, as espoused by the late, great Iain M Banks, suggests digital beings with intellectual capabilities greater than our own will most likely be liberated from the destructive desires of their fleshly forebears. Banks posits a galactic utopian civilisation, The Culture, in which eccentric, omniscient machines take great joy in indulging the cute whims of their human charges. These "minds" sit back like wise, all-powerful nursemaids while their simian inferiors bumble around the universe, interfering with every backward civilisation they find while simultaneously partying on til the break of dawn via genetically enhanced sexual organs and auto-synthesised recreational drugs.
• More from the Week in geek series
• 2014 preview: sci-fi films to watch over the next 12 months
There seem to be two schools of thought in science fiction about artificial intelligence. The first, as espoused by the late, great Iain M Banks, suggests digital beings with intellectual capabilities greater than our own will most likely be liberated from the destructive desires of their fleshly forebears. Banks posits a galactic utopian civilisation, The Culture, in which eccentric, omniscient machines take great joy in indulging the cute whims of their human charges. These "minds" sit back like wise, all-powerful nursemaids while their simian inferiors bumble around the universe, interfering with every backward civilisation they find while simultaneously partying on til the break of dawn via genetically enhanced sexual organs and auto-synthesised recreational drugs.
- 2/14/2014
- by Ben Child
- The Guardian - Film News
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