- Directed by Caradog W. James
- Written by Caradog E. James
- Stars Toby Stephens, Caity Lotz, Denis Lawson
- Run Time: 1 Hour, 31 Minutes
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9oa93BrNuw
Spoiler-Free Judgement Zone
Synopsis
A Cold War with China has forced the west into the deepest recession in recorded history. There’s a new AI-based arms race.
Vincent works to rehabilitate war-wounded men with brain damage. One of them, Paul Dawson, goes berserk and kills a bunch of people in the lab and seriously wounds Vincent.
After a long recovery, Vincent continues working on artificial intelligence. He does a Turing test on various intelligences. His daughter is blind and deaf, and he has to feed her through a tube.
He’s very impressed with Ava’s machine. He wants her to come work for him. When she goes to work, an old woman opens her car door and says “They’ve got my son!” Eventually, she gets inside. The old woman is Paul Dawson’s mother, and Vincent lies about what happened to him, saying Paul’s mother is deranged.
The guards at the base are all war veterans with brain injuries and implants that help them survive; they’re all mute. Except we see that they can speak with each other. We see, but Ava doesn’t, that some nasty stuff is still going on here.
Ava is impressed with the man getting prosthetic arms. He whispers to her, “Area 6.” They claim to be helping these vets, but they’re also being treated like prisoners. The machines listen to everything.
The base’s boss, Thomson, finds Ava is using a hacking device to find out more about Area 6. He also has a plan to use robots to infiltrate and kill the Chinese government before a war can start.
That night in the car, Vincent admits that he wants to use all this AI research to help cure his daughter with implants to cure her brain disease. They stop to pick up Mrs. Dawson on the side of the road, but the old lady turns out to be a Chinese agent in disguise who kills Ava. Not really; Thomson was behind the assassination.
Vincent makes his next robot look and sound like Ava. In a test, they scare the new robot, and she kills the man. Thomson’s implanted assistant, Suri, comes to see the machine, and it talks to her in her own language. It’s clear that there is more going on with the implanted people than is generally known.
Vincent is called away to deal with his sick daughter and when he returns, The Machine can now dance. She’s smarter than anyone expected; Ava’s mind is in there somewhere. Vincent goes back to the hospital and does full body and mind scans of Mary, his daughter.
Thomson has installed a lot of secret knowledge; languages, combat skills, and so forth. He introduces The Machine to the man who killed Ava. It doesn’t take too much persuasion for her to hurt the man, but she refuses to kill him. After a little more “convincing” she does the job.
Every time Vincent goes to the hospital for his daughter, Thomson does some kind of military testing and training with The Machine. Vincent’s daughter finally dies.
Vincent comes to the conclusion that The Machine is alive and conscious, and Thomson thinks that’s a horrible problem. Thomson tells Vincent to turn down The Machine’s intelligence and then he can work on his daughter Mary’s replacement. Vincent ends up doing brain surgery on The Machine and removing her “soul.” Thomson goes back on his word and deletes Mary’s program.
The Machine does well in combat tests, killing without hesitation.
Suri has something going on with the security drones. It turns out that Vincent’s surgery only removed the GPS battery so they can’t trace her. She releases Vincent and then goes to rescue Mary’s program. The security guards revolt, killing the scientists. Thomson tries to disable the guards’ implants, but he’s locked out by Suri.
Vincent gives James his arms, and he and some of the other vets/prisoners help him. Vincent then turns off the cooling system, which will self-destruct the base. The Machine confronts Thomson and squishes his brain. The Machine downloads Mary’s program, and she and Vincent drive away.
Commentary
The music and lighting are trying to be very reminiscent of Blade Runner, and obviously, some of the themes are closely related.
There’s a lot of middle-of-the-road-level CGI here, but this wasn’t a low budget film. The sets, acting, and story are all very strong. There aren’t many new sci-fi ideas presented here, but they are combined in an interesting way.