'Her' meets 'Blade Runner' in this overly-derivative tale of an inventor of AI 'synethetics' who falls in love with his own creation. The story touches on how we willingly humanise technology for our own human desires, and how tolerance and acceptance might be extended to non-human life forms - and how they, in their evolving emotional intelligence, might tolerate, accept and pity us. But is it love? These are all interesting questions, but ultimately remain under-developed in this movie which fails to fully mine the heady themes it sets up. The narrative seems too obsessed with tribute nods to Blade Runner - mechanical voiced surveys, synthetics as sex toys, memory implants - and less interested in pushing its characters and questions to extremes in order to surprise and disturb. As a result, it fails the plausibility test that such futuristic stories undergo. It isn't convincing. At no point did I think, 'Yes, this is what we could become.' And that is where the film differs from Her and Blade Runner. This is a familiar story of boy meets girl, gets girl, loses girl, tries to win her back. The sentimental music is overly-manipulative. It's a teary love story, with light sci-fi decorations in the frame. Beautifully shot, and has decent acting performances, but ultimately bland and disappointing.
