A great article on Ian Watson’s collaboration with Kubrick on A.I., which has many great bits, including this one:
One day Emilio (red: Kubrick’s chauffeur) was driving me down the M1 motorway in the charcoal-coloured Mercedes en route to the manor house. “Ian,†he said, “Stanley phoned me on Sunday afternoon, even though he promised I could have Sunday afternoon to myself. ‘I need some string, Emilio,’ he told me. Stanley likes to tie things up with string. Ah but Ian,†continued Emilio, “I know about these things by now. So I said, ‘Stanley, where are you?’ ‘I’m in the computer room.’ ‘All right, Stanley, do you see the wall with the shelves? On the middle shelf in the middle there is a ball of string.’ ‘I can see it!’ ‘Wait! Go directly to the shelf, and come back here with the string, and tell me you have it!’ ‘Ian,’ said Emilio triumphantly, ‘I have string in every room for situations like this. And I also have extra balls of string hidden in each room as well!†#
And of course this one, which goes out to Martin and Poulsen:
I had written a novel entitled Inquisitor set in the wacky far-future world of Games Workshop’s Warhammer 40,000; he wanted a pre-publication printout right away. “Who knows, Ian?†he mused. “Maybe this is my next movie?†I arranged for Games Workshop to send him samples of their games and artwork and obtained for him from fantasy artist Ian Miller a portfolio of drawings of monsters. Anything could be grist to the mill, now or at some future date.
Incidentally, I like inquiring fresh minds what they thought of A.I… What did you think of A.I.?
AI is one of the few movies where i nearly walked out of the cinema. it could just all be down to spielberg’s direction, but i found it overly long, overly cute, and its attempts at “dark and gritty” felt like a far too clean, PG13 view of comical grit. and yes, when you think the gruesome movie is finally over, there’s another 15 or so minutes in the future, which just feel jarringly tacked on and drowned in sappy melodramatics.
While A.I. is far from perfect, it is a movie about grand ideas, which can’t be said for most modern “science fiction.”
There are also some Spielberg touches you can’t help but enjoy, like the talking teddy bear.
It’s also an example of a science fiction movie whose special effects are damn near perfect. The visuals will hold up for years to come.
Thinking about it makes me want to watch the movie again…
Like most Kubrick movies you’re either going to like it or not. No amount of convincing will ever change your mind. Kubrick’s films have a knack for either being permanently endearing or permanently avoided.
Oh, and also, as with all Kubrick films be well rested before attempting to watch. Even Full Metal Jacket can put someone to sleep.
I liked AI. I get the impression people expected it to be something iconic and landmark, which it wasn’t. If you want that, then I can see that it would disappoint. It grew out of a short story, and to me that is reflected in the stature of the film.
I could see also that it had pacing problems. The last section did initially feel unnecessary. Once I got to the end of it, I found it incredibly harrowing, so I thought it was ultimately successful. I can see that a different person could consider it “sappy melodramatics”, and so I won’t argue against that valid opinion.
I like AI but I also knew for a couple years what the movie was going to be.
The things people seem to attribute to Spielberg were usually not his at all.
The talking bear was in the short story that the script was based on. The “tacked-on” ending was in the script from early drafts, it wasn’t tacked on at all, it was the point of the movie, the reason the movie exists is to get to that point, the point that started with Kubrick’s 2001 (or early, if you want to trace the ideas back to the namesake of the 2001 theme song, Friedrich Nietzsche’s “Thus Spoke Zarathustra”).
The lightness contrasting the dark grit was the very reason Kubrick wanted Spielberg to direct it. Kubrick knew he would make it too dark and ruin it so he wanted to balance that by letting Spielberg direct it.
i just bought it on dvd, actually. two-disc special edition for $6, why not?
i haven’t rewatched all of it yet, just part three. (part one is the boy and his mother which goes horribly wrong, part two is the boy and gigolo joe, and part three is the boy and ben kingsley and his mother again).
that long tracking shot into the ice excavation was amazing on the big screen when i saw the movie initially. joe’s final moments are still compelling, but i’m no longer quite as sold on haley joel osmont’s skills. some of the bits were solid, but a lot of it felt forced.
but ben kingsley’s narration was great, and i totally bought him as that robot alien thing. whatever the hell it was.
what bugged me this time around was that the ice excavation doesn’t make any sense. first off, why did humanity go extinct in only 2000 years, and second, how exactly did the oceans rise and then freeze solid? glaciation would have simply leveled nyc instead of absorbing it, so this must have been heavy global warming and then a flash freeze.
it just doesn’t quite add up.
still, an amazing shot. although the first thing you see as the little cube-ship thing flies past the camera is the twin towers.
i liked the middle bits the best, the beginning and ending being hard to watch for multiple reasons. minority report was better, i thought. but i have a thing for samantha morton, so my opinion here may be suspect.