i saw ai today. i had lowered my expectations because of the negativity i’d heard (despite the generally positive reviews in the mainstream press), but i was pleasantly surprised by the first two hours. and i was feeling pretty good about it until the very end… ick. oh, some thoughts (spoilers): as i see it, there are two options. cut off the whole ending (but unacceptably i think, change the theme/message of the movie), or … and this is the frustrating part, just to have done it a bit better, without the 10 minutes of exposition and contrivances. ie, thematically the coda was fine: david’s quest was to find love, that was what he was designed for. he would love forever. but why are we being bludgeoned about it? anyway, the execution sucked. the original david in a virtual world ending would have worked also (actually, it very well could be the case, but it’s one of those things you would have to imagine. maybe if you were a critical studies major you could write a paper arguing it, but that’s beside the point right?). in a way it reminded me of the type of frustration i had with contact.
there’s some neat stuff going on though: oedipal / freudian subtext, wish fulfillment, god-shaped hole, the simulacral, and the juxtaposition of some of these (super-bleak and cynical) meditations couched within 1) a fairy tale, and 2) spielberg schmaltz. well, it’s left me thinking despite the complete derailment in the end.