Finally I was able to watch this anticipated movie. I was waiting for this because of the reviews I received from my friends who also encouraged me to watch it since it’s about AI. Personally I have been much fascinated with the idea of AI more than 20 years ago and expecting a future we are seeing it nowadays and waiting for a future where AI is used in almost our daily activities.

The fun was this is considered (as far as I know) the only movie where AI is not an antagonist entity (unlike the last movie of James Bond and Mission Impossible 7). And actually shows the strong positive bond an AI can make with human for both sides benefits. Though skeptical about such a future but the movie was touching and heartwarming with a beautiful act of Madeleine Yuna Voyles as Alphie. Despite her age she was able to transfer the emotions.

Overall the story was nothing new except the vintage point of seeing human as the cause of network malfunction causing a disaster and its greed to take power over everything and unlike many other movie, here an AI is the bridge connecting mankind to future AI networks.

In the movie there is a line between the new AI named Alphie and Joshua (the main character that goes this way:

Alphie:   what’s heaven?

Joshua:  It’s peaceful place in the sky.

Alphie:   Are you going to heaven?

Joshua:  No.

Alphie:   Why not?

Joshua:  You got to be a good person to go to heaven.

Alphie:   Then we’re the same. We can’t go to heaven. Because you are not good and I’m not a person.

This sentences made me think how each of us as human act in our daily basis. How do we judge ourselves and others. Aren’t we considering not being good (mostly others and sometimes ourselves) and we curse many (sometimes including ourselves) not to act as human? It was funny how an AI’s comment can actually be applied to us as humans.

Isn’t it that sometimes we act in a way that either is not good or is not considered humane? then why? Have we ever thought about that?

And if we will be able to act from love towards each other, then does it matter if the other person is actually human, animal or robot who could feel?

Another phrase that I loved and mentioned in the movie is “we are all connected”. And imagine if consider this and implement this into our daily lives. Then definitely we neither act bad nor inhumane.

Though this movie was about the possibility of a love relationship between man and AI (which honestly as new researches show is not impossible and far away) but I love the movie even when I tried to go deeper on the names chosen for the characters.

The machine that was made to destroy robots was called NOMAD, which if you reverse it will be DAMON which means to overpower, subdue and conquer. And its purpose was to conquer the robots and destroy any colony (including humans) if they support robots or AIs.

The main character was named Joshua, meaning God is Salvation, and in his journey with all its ups and downs comes to a realization where a creator tries to teach him. And finally his salvation comes to the understanding of the true meaning the creator in the movie tries to tell.

Maya was the name of Joshua’s partner who was the actual Manantra (the creator). The fundamental concept in Hindu philosophy notably in the Advaita (nondualist) school of Vedanta, Maya originally denoted the magic power with which a god can make human beings believe in what turns out to be an illusion. In some other contexts it also means magic, where in the movie she created an AI that can grow and feels emotions. Also in some other cultures in means water, something that is necessary for a living to live and grow. like a gardener who waters the soil to blossom and flourish.

And lastly the created AI who was called Alphie, which originates from the Old German Alfuns, where adal means “nobel” and funs means “ready”.

I don’t know if the names were really chosen by the writers in purpose but I have to admit each chosen name for each character were perfectly chosen and fitted the character no matter human or AI.

The movie had few bugs that couldn’t be explained (at least with todays science) like how a robot who is made of a hardware parts can grow is size like a human being, but when it came to the context and the delivery of emotions and CGI effect, it did good. Though I don’t expect it to win any awards in neither Golden Globe nor Academy Awards.

But the lesson which I learned was,

“for one to see the heaven (a peaceful place), he/she should act good as a person.”