Amelia 2.0 (2017) User Reviews

What about the soul?...

[paul_haakonsen · 6/10 · 18 August 2017]

When I found "Amelia 2.0" I didn't even read the synopsis for the movie, nor did I know anything about the movie, I just picked it up and decided to give it a go.

First of all, I must say that writer Rob Merritt definitely came up with a very interesting and entertaining story here. And better yet, it is a story which raises a lot of questions in the audience as you view it, in terms of your own views on the issues being dealt with throughout the movie. And for a movie to be able to raise that kind of questions, that is something that I find rather impressive.

The special effects and CGI effects in "Amelia 2.0" were quite good and really worked in favor of the movie. And for a Sci-Fi movie of this nature then having special effects is definitely a plus. If the movie had less impressive CGI, then the movie would have been much less enjoyable or convincing.

"Amelie 2.0" has an ensemble of good acting talents, which were for the most part new faces to me. And I do enjoy watching new actors and actresses on the screen, as there are no associations to other previous characters linked to the performers. So that was a definite plus in my book. The actors and actresses in the movie were doing good jobs with their given roles and characters, and that was working well in favor of the movie.

Director Adam Orton did a great job in bringing writer Rob Merritt's story to life on the screen.

The characters in the movie are quite well-rounded and they have very distinct personalities and traits. And the dialogue throughout the course of the movie was well written and delivered by the various actors and actresses.

The movie makes use of way too many short shots of random and pointless images that serves absolutely no purpose to the movie, aside from being fillers. That was particularly true for the first 10-15 minutes of the movie.

I really enjoyed how this movie raises some issues and questions about humanity, the ability to replace the body in parts or as a whole, and how the soul fits into all of this if you take a religious stand on it. But also how traditional and inbred thinking stands in the way of technological advancement and the fear of embracing new and innovating things that break up with how things traditionally are and have been for a long, long time.

I have a feeling that this movie might be very underrated and slip under most people's radar. However, I can most strongly recommend that you take the time to sit down to watch "Amelia 2.0" if you have the chance.

The ending of the movie was not really one that did the movie or the storyline much justice, and it felt just like it was a very, very wrong way to end the movie.

Morality play/tragedy in Science Fiction format.

[safeJ · 6/10 · 11 August 2017]

Though set in a science fiction format, this movie centers on a deeply loving newlywed couple overcome by tragedy and how the husband deals with this issue. In his grief, he agrees to the plans of a corporate giant in the remote hope of "curing" his wife's terminal condition.

Technically, the film is state of the art with some obvious exceptions. Note the aerial view of the corporate campus looking quite cartoonish, like an architectural drawing or SimCity home computer creation.

The flow of action was quite uneven, spending long moments in philosophical discussions while skimming over the scientific elements of the story (the "how it was done" aspects). The ending was quite disturbing to me and didn't seem possible, given modern corporate security methods. It appeared that the film was running out of time (or money) and ended quite abruptly in poetry and bucolic bliss.

Frankenstein has a new face

[nogodnomasters · 6/10 · 9 August 2017]

This is a 21st century retelling of the Frankenstein story. The difference is that the body is an android and they have placed the memory of a real human in the system. Amelia had a functional brain but had a condition which paralyzed her. There is an ethic debate over the issue which was done from strictly a theological view point. The ending was messed up and the film slow at times.Mildly entertaining science fiction which concentrated too much on a poorly scripted debate that we had in the 19th century.

Guide: no swearing, sex, or nudity.

A good example of a great idea poorly developed

[eunbi0530 · 4/10 · 13 August 2017]

Another approach for the Theseus's paradox, what makes us "us"? Is it our bodies? Our conscience? Our memories? If we maintain our conscience, but change the body, are we the same? If our memories are implemented in another being, do we "die" and, at the same time, reborn in another body? The film uses this complex discussion and distillate it - a lot - for the viewer, it is so watered down that we can't even consider it with a philosophical concept anymore.

(here I start nitpicking, if you don't like that skip the next paragraph)

Maybe it happened like this for plot reasons, but some things didn't make sense, for instance: when Amelia (android) had her first contact with Amelia's (the deceased wife) memories, everything was fine until her system conflicts with the fact that the deceased wife is dead. The android believes that she is still that Amelia, but how come can she be that Amelia if she shouldn't be awake? So her system enters in a breakdown and so does she. For me, understandable, the android would have access to an early memory that is triggered by two events: in school when a little girl approaches her and at home when she faints; fast forward to the android getting better acquainted with her body, and here starts the "plot-holes", Amelia known she is married, but doesn't know who the person she is married with, which doesn't make sense, a huge event such as a wedding isn't something that she should understand and even request for "my wedding ring". She must know what a wedding and a wedding ring represent, thus knowing that she has to be married with someone, being married implies that she has spent sometime with the other person - cue the memory she has of someone she can't remember her face, but makes her happy. It is highly unlikely that she only had one memory of that person, she must have done several other connections to connect someone as her husband, otherwise she wouldn't be able to recognise herself as a married woman, nor the value of her wedding ring.

Story wise I believe the script seemed rush, they tried to use a lot of different characters and it felt over-saturated, for instance the political part was rushed in some moments and wasn't used in its full potential. The characters development, considering those that have, is limited, some are out of nowhere as Max in love, others are expected as Paul being a greedy (companies and money vs. Science and patience). Some of the acting is distasteful, even though I didn't have my hopes high for some actors and actresses.

It is a 90 minutes film that will pass and you will feel like nothing changed in your life, as I said before the philosophical idea that could have been a mark of the film on the viewer was watered down, thus a plain film that will be forgettable for most.

A near-future science fiction drama about artificial consciousness.

[alockwood-76149 · 7/10 · 22 August 2017]

I thought this was a pretty good film. It wrestles with the question of consciousness and what makes us human. As a drama it delivers plenty of emotionally charged moments that keep you invested in the characters and the story. The acting is believable and well written. I would recommend this movie.

Amelia 0.2

[Larry-R · 5/10 · 31 December 2020]

If the teenage son of the owner of a local news station had to do a term paper for a first year philosophy class, and the news station owner decided it might get a better grade if it was a video, and told the crew at the station to make it, the video might come out something like "Amelia 2.0".

It's difficult to compare it to a movie or even a TV show because nowadays those almost always have relatively skilled professionals working on them, even if they have no talent. Regardless, the video addresses an interesting topic, but not in any meaningful way, and without the usual dramatic elements of fiction, even at the level of a docudrama or biopic.

It does have some competent professional actors, but they weren't given actual characters to portray, so it's sort of like they walked in off the street and were given lines to read. The editing was pretty tight though.

Does Nobody Find It At All Odd?

[iwatkin · 6/10 · 11 June 2019]

This movie could have been so much better. They had half-decent acting, a VFX budget to die for, and ultimately (I think) they ran out of time and money.

The story/script just didn't come together too well, and there are moments when things move very slowly and others were it's jarring and seems to jump from scene to scene.

The thing that really got me was the complete lack of logic at the close. Think of it; they want to put the memories of a dead woman in an android, and this kicks of a theistic and political debate about ethics and what is right. Fine. I get that people have a hard time dealing with that. But then, when the android is destroyed and the husband kills himself, the project suddenly becomes about copying Amelias's personality into dozens of sex androids... and nobody bats an eyelid. What?!!

Somewhat interesting, but...

[garcinder · 4/10 · 13 January 2021]

All in all, please just suspend disbelief. Doesn't get into the technical aspects of creating a simulacrum, but instead goes more after the moral implications of doing so. The choices are more on the order of black or white, not really much in between. And leave out the husband. He's there, and not really all that sympathetic, or quite mentally stable. Likely could have been better, but it seems to be more about moralizing than much else. The omnipresent, "if we can do it, should we?"

"An average movie, good for a one time watch"

[vishnu-dileep08 · 6/10 · 16 September 2017]

This movie is a story of Amelia who lived with her husband but one day bad luck strikes she dies at a young age so a company approaches her husband telling him that they have a way to bring her back.

The story line was good but I don't think people are going to be very impressed after watching this movie because we have encountered many movies with this same kind of stories. The girl who did Amelia could have done a better job cause at some scenes of this movie when she becomes all bubbly she sounds like a retard. But rest of the actors did a good job. The ending was good and unpredictable.

Yes i would ask everyone to give this movie a shot I know you guys have encountered movies like this before.

My Rating 6/10

Boring

[muscillopanella1622 · 2/10 · 16 December 2021]

Bad execution. Very bad acting. Poor drama. Lazy sript.

Looks like never end.

Fx are very Fake.

The higher rates are mmm .... I think this was like a very bad B-movie. Direct to TV.

Really boring. Nothing mutch to say in this movie.

Highly unusual

[Snootz · 9/10 · 28 September 2017]

At the time I write this review, the average rating is 5.6, which makes my rating of 9 a bit of a reversal for my reviews (I'm demanding in my story-telling and tend to rate films lower than the average audience).

This is a highly unusual rating situation for me. On the one hand there is almost nothing truly exceptional about this film. On the other... I almost gave it 10 stars for sheer excellence in presentation.* This movie is slow-moving, intricate, and asks some very difficult questions. I will not spoil any of the plot by discussing precisely why I found this story so engrossing, but there are several elements that make it applaud-worthy:

1. Sensible discussion of the concept of God and contrary opinions to such without overt blasphemy. It simply presents both sides of the viewpoint... quite well in my opinion.

2. It discusses the "soul" without becoming dogmatic.

3. It addresses ethical issues in regard to reproducing humans in a non-standard manner (again, no spoilers by discussing how. All that I am going to discuss here is what's presented in the summary and trailers.)

4. It really hits the emotions of every single role and does so very well. This is some of the best directing, acting and character portrayal I have seen in a long time.

5. It presents a couple of unexpected twists that really tie the story line together very well.

This film presents the questions, the arguments, the positions and personal issues of the subject matter in a surprisingly short period of time. This could have been a lengthy mini-series and held together well. That they accomplished what they did within the time allotment of a single film is pretty awesome.

In short, this film accomplished what I see so very few films accomplish these days: it told a story and told it very well. It didn't rely on heavy CGI, had almost no "action", and focused almost exclusively on the lives and roles of the people involved. There were no sharks jumped here, no absurdities (which is admirable in itself), no great big plot loopholes where there could have been many. They did surprisingly well in almost every aspect. It came very close to getting 10 stars, which I've given to fewer films than I have fingers. It may be a bit slow and uneventful for the adrenaline junkies of today's generation-- but for those who still appreciate the art of story telling and the morality play, this is a rare gem.

* I dropped my rating to a 9 for a single F-bomb which was out of context with the entire rest of the film and unnecessary to the plot. Consequences for directorial stupidity. It would be nice just once to see someone make an entire movie based purely on great story-telling rather than resorting to shock schlock. This movie *almost* made it. Still, worth every bit of the 9 stars I give it.

Enjoyable

[johngraham1964 · 7/10 · 6 October 2017]

I actually enjoyed this movie. It's not as challenging as it could be but there are some interesting twists and turns and all the leads put in good performances.

The main question of the film is: has whatever makes up the 'soul' of Amelia been transferred to the android body, or is it just a computer copy (a simple copy and paste)? From parts of the procedure it looks like it's the latter, with the process called 'mapping' rather than a transfer. So if you follow that line of thought then the rest of the film is rather pointless. But if you think the scientists have really managed to transfer Amelia into the android then the arguments put forward have more depth.

The scenes with the senator who opposes all such research are well-written, especially as he faces his own mortality.

I'm not sure about the bit just before the end where the corporation decides to use the Amelia mapping data to create androids for everyone. If they truly believed they had transferred Amelia into the android then they would be (effectively) cloning her thousands of times over and then allowing people to reprogram her - not something an ethical corporation should do. Mind you, we're left in no doubt that ethics are not on the mind of the corporation. Just the doctor - who is then left out of the loop.

The other ending - where the husband takes matters into his own hands - was much more satisfying and is probably where the film should have ended. Though finishing it with Amelia taking her own decision worked as well.

It's not that demanding a film but it is thought-provoking is certain ways.

Another reviewer bemoaned the CGI of the helicopter on the roof of the corporation and it IS dodgy, but mercifully brief. Other shots of the corporate HQ are also brief (and some at night) and are much better.

And yes, there are comparisons to Ex Machina in the plot line but as I found that film very predictable and this one at least had a twist towards the end then I'd recommend an unchallenging viewing of this film on a lazy evening.

Blatant attack on conservatives

[johnnyd1633 · 4/10 · 11 June 2019]

This was a blatant attack on Republican conservatives making them out as the bad guy wrapped into a badly acted Sci,-Fi movie

Amelia 2.0

[rnixon1974 · 5/10 · 6 December 2023]

This movie takes the human/cyborg narrative into areas that many writers choose not to explore. This is a compelling script, with decent performances from most of the cast. The story bogs down approximately 55 minutes in, and from there it does not truly recover, in my opinion.

I saw what the filmmakers (Merritt and Orton) were trying to convey, but the end result was not what it could have been. Angela Billman as the title character struggles valiantly with the less than stellar third act of this film, and she definitely deserves credit for her effort. Ben Whitehair delivers in a supporting role.

I want my 90 minutes back. Not even good for a TV movie.

[writewheelpub · 4/10 · 5 September 2023]

The subject is, of course, fantasy, but it could have been made into a riveting scifi movie. Instead it was turned into a morality tale. The acting was quite good, and did not give rise to the 4* rating. The characters were two dimensional though. Amelia, ironically, was the most developed.

The senator fulfilled every non-USA person's prejudice. The scientists the same. There's little to criticise in the god of your choice v, science, but this film told us what to think. That's copping out.

With better characterisation, with allowing viewers to come to a conclusion, with a bit more action, perhaps it might have been worth watching. It needed more development, more plot, more belief in the film's worth. I feel sorry for the actors who mostly seemed to want to entertain, to get us thinking. But they weren't given the chance.

It wasn't even a good TV movie.

Overall, very pleased

[fisherrose-10290 · 8/10 · 23 August 2017]

This was a movie made on a low budget, and I feel they did a fantastic job. I feel the strongest acting came from the supporting roles, but overall, great acting. Some people classify this as a science fiction movie, which it is, however, I feel the underlying message of love and existence and morality is what is meant to be delivered through the science fiction setting. It really does inspire you to think about which side of the issue you stand on. In my case, I changed my viewpoint a few different times throughout the movie. I felt the sound design could have use a little more support and a little slow-going in the first 10 minutes or so of the movie, but I would watch this movie again, and recommend it to my friends. Hats off to everyone involved in making this film. You all did a fantastic job.

thought provoking material

[drings · 8/10 · 22 August 2017]

This is an interesting movie about the potential effects of technology on humans. It's great to see some original subject matter in these days of comic book retreads and franchises! The cast does a fine job and it really does make you think about life and humanity. Thoroughly enjoyed it.

A film about trans humanism. Downloading consciousness into an android. Creates an ethical dilemma as this technology continues to evolve.

[marymeisterling · 10/10 · 10 August 2017]

This a very low budget independent film that explores the subject of downloading a conscious mind and then building an android that may look like the actual human. It is thought provoking on many different levels - what it means to be human, where is someone's soul and what life may look like in the future with ageless bodies and minds that continue to evolve.

Director

[reich-brandon · 8/10 · 22 August 2017]

Adam Orton is a promising young Director with great attention to detail. I can't wait to see what he'll make next! A independent film is a challenge to make on a low budget, but the creative team overcame the special effects obstacles, and the performances were exceptional! With the vision of the director, the editor was able to construct a high concept story into something vivid the audience can enjoy.

Eye Opener

[kristine-30486 · 9/10 · 17 August 2017]

This movie has provoked a hidden curiosity, maybe more so fear in me of how technology can/will dangerously minimize our human abilities. I think it's an important movie. It produces a motivation for education on what is to come for us in the not so distant future. Making the choice to deny our natural human emotions whether they are pain or joy, will have a negative consequence on all of humanity,makes me want to teach my grandchildren to garden, and build things so they don't forget what that is.. K.S.

More philosophical and relationship sci fi story than typical sci fi

[katetf · 8/10 · 26 August 2017]

I saw this originally as a play and while I preferred that (reasons related to the politician character) I did enjoy the movie. I took my 14,16 and 18 year old daughter and we had spirited discussion afterwards. I think it would be excellent to watch and discuss in high school and science science and computer science classes. The only questionable material for kids may be brief mention of sex dolls and implied gun violence. Kids under 12 may be bored. Well acted for the most part, low tech, fun scenery for Iowans to see. They skip through the science details and focus on the real philosophical dilemmas facing tech builders and policy makers today. Worth seeing.

All science, no philosophy

[bazingatozulus · 8/10 · 21 August 2017]

Some people have compared it to a modern Frankenstein story, but I don't think that this particular concept was appreciated for what it really was. Living in a modern world has led everyone of us to feel at one point that we live in a paper cup society where everything is or could be replaceable. This movie represents exactly what it was meant to represent "all science, no philosophy". It's all these questions that we want answers to, knowing full well that we won't get them because we're not meant to know, just like we're not meant to live forever. These questions will continue to haunt our society long after we're gone, only to one day come to the realization of what we all knew all along that our arrogance will be the catalyst of our own demise.

I quite enjoyed watching this movie.

[Chris Ellis · 8/10 · 22 August 2017]

Not having the critical acuity of Roger Ebert, I judge movies entirely by how much money I want back on the way out of the theatre. Watching Amelia 2.0 was delightful entertainment throughout and I didn't want any money back (though I found the popcorn overpriced). I am not a sci-fi fan. In 1977 I demanded and got my $4 back after a screening of Star Wars (but am still awaiting the public apology). Amelia 2.0 did not put me in mind of Star Wars and all that cgi gimcrackery, but did put me in mind of the 1978 movie Coma, after which I did not want any money back. All I remember about Coma - except Genevieve Bujold - is that it had something to do with malevolent forces and futuristic genetic manipulations and that I was satisfied with it. That's how I feel about Amelia 2.0. Enjoy the movie.

Beautiful, touching an thought-provoking

[RobbieWilkes · 8/10 · 10 October 2020]

Decided to take a look at this movie, just to see if if it was "any good", and I was pulled in and emotionally invested.

So many angles from which to view this, possible, future reality. I'm still processing it.

Once thing that I find very strange, is how this wonderful actress, Angela Billman, who played Amelia, is not in more movies. She is able to grab your heart, and does such an amazing job portraying the innocence, the confusion, the heartbreak.

This isn't an action flick, or really even a sci-fi movie. It's a romance wrapped up in a morality play.

I'm glad I took the chance and watched it.

Thumbs Up

[toz451 · 8/10 · 1 April 2021]

Intriguing and interesting movie. Surprisingly well done. I quite enjoyed it.