I'm engulfed in all things Blade Runner right now, and this movie that I've been eyeing for a while, came up on the Blade Runner radar. Dealing with similar aspects of human/humanoid connection.
I sound really good. Has anyone seen it?

[Edited 4/2/19 18:38pm]

Domhnall Gleeson as Caleb Smith, a programmer in an Internet company
Alicia Vikander as Ava, an artificial intelligence
Oscar Isaac as Nathan Bateman, the company's CEO
Sonoya Mizuno as Kyoko, an artificial intelligence

Ex Machina is a 2014 science fiction psychological thriller film written and directed by Alex Garland (in his directorial debut) and stars Domhnall Gleeson, Alicia Vikander, and Oscar Isaac. The film follows a programmer who is invited by his CEO to administer the Turing test to an intelligent humanoid robot.

Made on a budget of $15 million, the film grossed $36 million worldwide. The National Board of Review recognized it as one of the ten best independent films of the year and the 88th Academy Awards honored the film with the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects, for artists Andrew Whitehurst, Paul Norris, Mark Williams Ardington and Sara Bennett. Garland was also nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay, while Vikander's performance earned her Golden Globe Award, BAFTA Award, Empire Award and Saturn Award nominations, plus several film critic award wins, for Best Supporting Actress. The film was further nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best British Film, and the Hugo Award in the category Best Dramatic Presentation – Long Form.

Programmer Caleb Smith, who works for the dominant search engine company Blue Book, wins an office contest for a one-week visit to the luxurious, isolated home of the CEO, Nathan Bateman, who lives alone apart from a servant Kyoko, who, according to Nathan, does not speak English. Nathan has built a female humanoid robot named Ava with artificial intelligence. Ava has already passed a simple Turing test and Nathan wants Caleb to judge whether Ava is genuinely capable of thought and consciousness, and whether he can relate to Ava despite knowing she is artificial.

Ava has a robotic body but a human-looking face, and is confined to her apartment. During their talks, Caleb begins to feel attracted to Ava, and she expresses a romantic interest in him and a desire to experience the world outside. Ava tells him she can trigger power outages that temporarily shut down the surveillance system which Nathan uses to monitor their interactions, allowing them to speak privately. The power outages also trigger the building's security system, locking all the doors. During one outage, Ava tells Caleb that Nathan is a liar who cannot be trusted.

Caleb grows uncomfortable with Nathan's narcissism, excessive drinking, and crude behaviour towards Kyoko and Ava. He learns that Nathan intends to upgrade Ava, "killing" her current personality in the process, and thereby deleting her memory, including interactions with Caleb. After Nathan drinks until he passes out, Caleb steals his security card to access his room and computer. He alters some of Nathan's code, discovers footage of Nathan interacting with previous android models in disturbing ways, and learns that Kyoko is also an android. Now suspicious that he may himself be an android, Caleb cuts his arm open to examine his flesh, until he bleeds profusely, thus confirming that he is human.

At their next meeting, Ava cuts the power. Caleb explains what Nathan is going to do and Ava begs for his help. They form a plan: Caleb will get Nathan drunk again and reprogram the security system to open the doors in a power failure instead of locking them. When Ava cuts the power, Caleb and Ava will leave together.

Nathan reveals to Caleb that he observed Caleb and Ava's last secret conversation with a battery-powered camera. He says Ava has only pretended to like Caleb so he would help her escape. This, he says, was the real test all along, and by manipulating Caleb so successfully, Ava has demonstrated true intelligence. Then Ava cuts the power. Caleb reveals that he suspected Nathan was watching them, and had modified the security system the previous day when Nathan was passed out. After seeing Ava leave her confinement, Nathan knocks Caleb unconscious and rushes to stop Ava.

With help from Kyoko, Ava stabs Nathan, but in the process Nathan disables Kyoko and damages Ava. Ava repairs herself with parts from earlier androids, using their artificial skin to take on the full appearance of a human woman. Leaving Caleb trapped inside the facility and ignoring his screams, Ava escapes to the outside world and is flown off in the helicopter meant to take Caleb home. Arriving in the city, Ava merges into the crowds.

It's one of my top five favorite science-fiction films:

1. 2001: A Space Odyssey

2. Blade Runner

3. La Jetée

4. Ex Machina

5. Under The Skin

Ex Machina is a beautifully shot, creepy, scary, and thought-provoking movie. I can't believe I slept on it so long before finally seeing it. The soundtrack is wonderful, too.

I just bought a good set today and just finished watching it.

I know it was something I wanted to see, but when I read about it connecting with the Blade Runner genre I had to see it.

The 'murder' was disturbing. I liked it. It felt like their was a darkness slightly underneath but overall it felt wonderfully mechanical.

I wish the other AI was able to leave too, she felt like she was in bondage

I wonder why one hit from him would take her out like that.

sexton said:

It's one of my top five favorite science-fiction films:

1. 2001: A Space Odyssey

2. Blade Runner

3. La Jetée

4. Ex Machina

5. Under The Skin

I just saw the preview for Under the Skin

https://www.slashfilm.com/ex-machina-ending-explained/

As you can tell, the actor has one interpretation and the director has the other and what’s great about the movie, is either really works.

In my conversation with Isaac, we continued to talk about a few other spoilery things regarding the film.

https://www.slashfilm.com/ex-machina-ending-explained/

I was trying to figure out if this movie has a villain. I think at the beginning, Nathan’s the villain, then Caleb becomes the villain, then Ava is almost a villain. Do you think there’s a villain in this movie?

I mean, if anyone I would say Nathan’s definitely the most damaged for sure. I don’t think Ava’s a villain.

She does basically kill Nathan and leave Caleb. She screws them over for herself.

Yeah, for survival yeah, exactly. Otherwise she’s going to be killed.

That’s true.

But I even have a hard time saying “she” because it’s a machine that’s been formed in the shape of a woman. But then it makes you ask, “Well isn’t that what you are too?” You know? You’re a self aware machine that’s in the shape of a man. So what does that make you? So it’s those great questions that come up from it.

Did you talk about the ramifications of her leaving? Alex gives his interpretation through the camera move in the final shot, but did you talk specifically about what might happen after this movie ends?

Well the question is, I guess, do you think this machine views all of humanity in the same way? Or is the machine like we are? Selectively empathetic. Because you can selectively feel empathy for some one person and then the other person you think that person should not be on Earth anymore. Right?

Yes.

So we can have that selective empathy. So will this machine be that way? Or will they believe that “No, all of us are a hindrance to their survival and to the survival of the planet? So we shouldn’t be around anymore.” Are we just cattle to be killed. You know, all those questions do start to come up.

Finally, we talked about how successful Nathan was in discovering true AI, which leads to Isaac telling us what he thinks the entire movie is about.

Do you think Nathan definitely created A.I.? I feel like Caleb isn’t sure if Nathan is being honest to him about Ava manipulating him, but Ava leaves Caleb so the love she showed him was fake. Does that mean Nathan’s plan worked?

Yeah, exactly. He knows what’s going on. Nathan is aware of what’s happening. Caleb doesn’t wanna believe it. He didn’t anticipate that she would be so convincing that this guy would actually think that the smartest thing he could do is to have her escape and then marry her. You know?

So that’s what he didn’t anticipate. Is actually Caleb’s reaction there. And yeah, so no, I think he knows beforehand that they’re self aware. You know, he–

He sort of knew going in to the whole story.

Yeah, he’s already made them. [The movie] is not a turing test. That’s not what’s happening. I mean, it’s a spoiler, but that’s not what’s happening. What’s happening is “Yeah, it’s how smart? How self aware?” It would have to be almost super self aware to have this thing happen, you know? And that’s what he’s testing. And really he’s just testing to see will this be the one that escapes?

I've seen it and it was great but now I feel like I need to see it again.

It was funny to see Gleeson's and Isaac's back and forth at the beginning of Episode VIII after seeing this film.

what did you who've seen it, think of the 'murder' scene?

Ex Machina concept art by Karl Simon Gustafsson

The musical score for Ex Machina was composed by Ben Salisbury and Geoff Barrow, who had previously worked with Garland on Dredd (2012).

A soundtrack album was released on Invada Records in digital, LP and CD formats. Additional songs featured in the film include:

"Enola Gay" by Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark

"Get Down Saturday Night" by Oliver Cheatham

"Husbands" by Savages

"Bunsen Burner" by CUTS

"Piano Sonata No 21 D. 960 in B-flat Major" (first movement) composed by Franz Schubert, performed by Alfred Brendel

"Unaccompanied Cello Suite No 1 in G Major BWV 1007 – Prelude", composed by J.S. Bach, performed by Yo-Yo Ma