AIs, Murderous Showgirls and Other(ed) Monstrous Sights
Re-presenting the Abnormal in Cinema
In Alex Garland’s directorial debut ‘Ex Machina’ (2014), Ava is a humanoid AI robot created by tech guru Nathan Bateman. Ava is confined to the basement of Nathan’s secluded research facility in an Alaskan forest. When Nathan enlists his company employee Caleb to be the human component in Ava’s Turing test, the film’s atmosphere is haunted by culturally dominant questions regarding AI robots’ consciousness and capacity to feel emotions. However, ‘Ex Machina’ leaves these human- (…)
