"AI" discussion: 5/05/02 - 5/11/02

[Morticia]

This is a thread to discuss the technical and/or thematic merits of "A.I."

The purpose being to foster intelligent discussion of films without resorting to "It's a piece of crap." or "It's the greatest film ever." (And so that we all can gain a bit of a film education from everyone.)

We'll discuss a new film each week. Either slade (take that Taxi ) or I will post the film in this forum in advance, and lock the topic until the first day of discussion.

Thanks everyone. We are excited and we hope this works (we're open to any ideas of how to make it better).

****SPOILER WARNING**** of course this entire thread is going to be full of spoilers.

[Taxi]

Talking about yourself in the third person, eh? Who do you think you are, the Rock?

[Morticia]

hehe.

Copy/Paste Demon Strikes Again!!

[Morticia]

Film Class is now open, please discuss...

[Underpants]

A.I. is a film that touched me deeply with it's simple message of how precious love is and how far a being.. whether real or not would go to know what love was.

Visually striking and wonderfully acted, particularly by Haley Joel Osment as David.

My only minor complaint (though more of an afterthought suggestion really) about the film was the whole love bot sequence with Jude Law's character. I thought this could have been eliminated and he could have simply explained what he was to David. We didn't need to see where he came from. I say that only because I think the film could have been good for younger children to see if this segment were gone and the flesh fair toned down a bit. Just my opinion, and I still think the film is brilliant for adults as-is.

As for the much-criticized ending being too long, I simply don't agree. I don't want the film to end by that point. I am completely in awe of this beautiful film. I think you either get it or you don't.

Sorry I can't get technical about the film. It's to beautifully made for me to analyze in that manner

[Porkchop]

I'm a great admirer of the film as well. In my last viewing of it (my third) I latched onto a symbolic thread running through it: hands. Notice some of the times when hands are important...
- Monica holds David's hand while his insides are being "cleaned". (I can't remember if this is the first time she holds his hand or not, but it might be.) Then when she panics she leaves his hand sticking straight up on its own in an empty frame.
- when Monica reads the imprinting protocol, she has to put her hand on the back of David's neck. This pose is more or less repeated later when she's abandoning David in the woods and he clutches both hands on the back of HER neck.
- when Monica gets the news of her son's awakening, the camera focuses on her empty hand clutching the wall. This shot is again mirrored almost exactly much later--when Monica is being re-awakened, the camera passes through a close-up of David's hand clutching the wall.
- when David fears for his life at the Flesh Fair, he takes Joe's hand and will not let go
- when the Specialist arrives to explain things to David, he takes David not by the hand, but by the wrist
- at the end of their day together, there is a lingering close-up of David's and Monica's hands joined together as he leads her back to bed.
- when David "dies" in the final scene, he's clutching his mother's hand

Any thoughts on this?

[George McFly]

I'll sup it it right here AI is a weird as the person who started this thread

j/k Morticia, I still lve ya

[newt]

I can't believe how little women have progressed in the future. To my knowledge, Monica is a housewife and has little say in decisions regarding her marriage. The husband is the boss.

[cardaway]

I agree about the importance of the the hands. The whole movie seemed to be about the innocent intamacy that hand holding, or lack there of, represents.

I bought the DVD without seeing the movie and I'm glad I did. I loved it. I will watch it over and over and enjoy something different.

I did have a psyuedo complaint come from a friend that I agree with. He likes the movie and likes the DVD even better... his reaosn... he can turn the movie off at any one of the many endings, depending on his mood.

[MrSoze]

Greetings!

After seeing AI enough times to choke a horse, I'm definitely curious to see what you all think of the marriage of director's styles between Kubrick and Spielberg.

When you really think about it, the story is relavtively pedestrian at its core- that of a boy who is unable to process his own feelings of loss, coupled with his own search for belonging. It's really a pretty fancy metaphor for normal human adolescence, IMHO. I think that, especially in context, the ending doesn't really work, simply because it seems so all or nothing to me- either you get past your problems, or you don't. Cut and dried. But here's the thing; life isn't really like that. We grow, we change, we move on. We get past some things, and not others. David is unable to do that, and therefore 'perishes,' so to speak. Seems just a little too obvious for a film for guy like Kubrick, but whatever.

The real question is, to me, about the direction. Could there be two more different directors to try to tandem a film together? You can see it like this sort of beautiful conflict at its heart- Spielberg uses alot of static shots, kind of coldly hanging on like a Kubrickian acolyte, but still can't resist showing off when he gets to the cities his 'big movie' touch for the massiveness that the screen can provide.

I think AI holds so much more value for fans of the directors than it does for the general public, and here's why- it has a heart that is hard to find, like most of Kubrick's films, but it also has a huge show-off (in a good way) running the show in Spielberg. It makes the film that much more flawed, but also that much more brillant. I still watch the scene where David attempts murder, and get the sense that the material, frankly, made Spielberg uncomfortable in a way that I think Stan Kubrick would not have been. I felt like Steven was there, waiting for the first moment he could to call 'cut' , whereas Stan would have been going for it even more, in his own cold style, that may have taken the audience out of the story instead of holding them in like Spielberg does. Spielberg seems like more of a 'normal' guy, whereas Stan not so much.

Spielberg, I think, really LIKES the ideas that are presented in AI, but he's afraid of going all the way with some of them, especially relating to Jude Law, etc. I think it helps and it hurts the movie, in that it inherently reins in scenes that may have hurt the film under the methodical hand of Kubrick, but it also undermines the fact that, damn it, Kubrick was going to MAKE us sit through this, and we were going to get the message, and we weren't going to feel better about it at the end, because it wasn't all right to feel better. That was Stanley- his films, to me are about feeling not entirely comfortable as a human being, in my own skin, as though I'm somehow a victim of my own flaws without actually being a participant in them. (I think that made sense) All I'm trying to say is that Kubrick didn't let people off the hook with the we're only human excuse.

Contrast that to Spielberg. He plays it safe, but he is all about the fact that we can, and indeed do, conquer most of the obstacles in front of us in this life, and that we do it, alot of the time, in spectacular ways. Close Encounters, ET, Jurassic Park, Jaws, heck even Schindler's List, are all about people who conquer some force in society, some sort of overwhelming opposition. It's just so interesting to me to watch a director who has such optimism for what human beings can accomplish take on a project from another director whose films constantly remind us that we are inherently restricted by the fact that we are men and women, and therefore we have inherent obstacles that prevent us from attaining our goals without severe heartache.

AI is a train wreck that you discuss. If I could judge the movie objectively, I would, but I can't, because it's been the subject for a TON of late night discussion for me, and that, to me, is a movie that succeeded. Maybe not in a totally straightforward way (I've had a bunch of friends who turn to me and say: 'I don't get it' after the movie ends) but in a way that makes me, the movie fan, quite happy.

Yours in the Force,
Rick Poehling

The Clones ATTACK! MAY 16th! LINE UP NOW!! :jawa:

[Porkchop]

Originally posted by MrSoze
I still watch the scene where David attempts murder, and get the sense that the material, frankly, made Spielberg uncomfortable in a way that I think Stan Kubrick would not have been.

Sorry, but in what scene does David attempt murder? True, he almost kills his "brother" by pulling him into the pool, but that is by accident.

What adds an extra layer to the interesting clash of directorial styles in this film is the fact that Kubrick himself wanted Spielberg to direct it. He thought it was closer to Spielberg's sensibilities than his own. So it's clear that, had Stanley made it, it would have been a very different film. But given his own uncertainty about being able to make it, it probably wouldn't have been the film that even Kubrick himself wanted it to be.

[Lo Pan]

Originally posted by Porkchop



Sorry, but in what scene does David attempt murder?

He does brutally attack the 'other' David.

[Morticia]

OK, I saw this film in the theatres, and enjoyed it. I have the DVD, and for some reason, didn't enjoy it quite as much the second time. I'm not sure why, and for all I know it could have been 'one of those days.'

In any case, I noticed another visual cue, besides the hands (nice catch Porkchop).

In two separate scenes, David looks through the eyes of something else. In one, towards the end, it's another "David". I can't remember the other one and will put it in here when I find it.

Is this showing how David is like any other child, trying to understand his world through eyes given to him? Or is it trying to show his artificiality? I think it could go both ways and I'm not 100% sure it even means anything.

The Use of Color
Notice all the blue? The car is blue, David's eyes are blue, a lot of Rouge City is blue, the moon and chase before the Flesh Fair is tinted blue (as well as a lot of the Flesh Fair itself). His/Martin's bed glows blue at night, and Monica wears a lot of blue. The only time we see them using the phone, to get news of Martin, the phone glows blue. The house is awash in blue light, and naturally the pool is blue. Joe's medallion glows blue. Dr. Know's room is very blue, and the letters giving David his final mission are blue. The ice is blue, and then there's the Blue Fairy.

What does all the blue mean? Well, blue has been traditionally the color that little boys get stuck with. Boy=blue, girl=pink. In addition, blue symbolizes innocence/purity, and calm and tranquility. I would venture to say that there is a lot of innocence in this film (symbolized by David, the eternal child) but not a lot of calm and tranquilty. Perhaps it's David's search for calm and tranquility, to simply be loved by his mother.

That's all I can come up with for now.....