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Artificial Intelligence has been around for a while in cinema. Check out these ten best movies that explored AI.
Over the years, movies on AI have contemplated the relationship we have had with technology – from apocalyptic to romantic. Often it leaves us with intriguing questions and criticisms of ourselves. These are 20 best movies that explored AI in contemplative, interesting ways that can you catch up on, on weekends to fight your lockdown blues.1. A.I Artificial Intelligence (2001)
Based on a Brian Aldiss short story, A.I. tells the story of an ultra-realistic robot boy (played by Haley Joel Osment) who’s abandoned by his human masters and left to search the world to learn his purpose. At once dazzling and despairing, the film is a sprawling odyssey that asks what makes us human – and doesn’t offer many reassuring answers.
IMDB Rating: 6.2/10
2. Wall – E (2008)
This Disney film was surprisingly rich with thematic ideas. It doesn’t paint humans in a positive light. There is, of course, the premise that humans abandoned Earth after we environmentally compromised it. Ultimately, we rely on AI for survival and mundane tasks alike. We become mindless drones with minimal interaction, while WALL-E finds love in EVE. The movie is a neat dichotomy but includes plenty of family-friendly charm and comedy.
IMDB Rating: 7.6/10
3. Ex Machina (2014)
This is an intriguing take on artificial intelligence. It plays out as a horror movie, isolating the protagonists with a volatile threat. It stars Oscar Isaac and Alicia Vikander, who deliver a surprisingly brilliant performance. Although there are more elements of a thriller, this claustrophobic chess match discusses how we might treat something so similar to humankind. With sexuality and ethics at the forefront, it’s a compelling nod to Kubrickian storytelling.
IMDB Rating: 7.5/10
4. I, Robot (2004)
The protagonist’s bias against AI is warranted. A robot rescues him instead of pursuing a girl, as they both drown. It’s an example of the flaw in logic-based existence—it is unsympathetic. The antagonist, Sonny, is a fascinating character who doesn’t understand why he transcends his peers. The film discusses interesting aspects of our relationship with AI, including friendships, murder and judgment. After all, the old models we callously threw away save the protagonist.
IMDB Rating: 8.5/10
5. 2001: A Space Odessey
The calm and soft-spoken HAL is given an intriguing personality. His reserved voice is certainly a terrifying contrast to his mercilessness. HAL reads lips, rejects being disconnected and thinks critically to plot survival. It’s unclear if HAL genuinely desires survival or continuation of his duties, given the pleading in his death scene. Besides foolishly allowing him extreme control, human programming could easily be responsible for his violence. These ideas are monumental, directly influencing every subsequent AI on film.
IMDB Rating: 6.4/ 10
6. Her (2013)
This is a film that illustrates how disconnected humans are. The protagonist’s relationship with AI Samantha is more charming than most romcoms. The mere premise that we might construct our own ideal relationship by submitting personal information is a fascinating vice to explore. Although the film depicts human relationships as seedy, unfulfilling, and our romances with AI will always be a falsehood. This is a blatant commentary on the flaw of AI relationships—AI is simply far beyond our understanding and will result in total unpredictability.
IMDB Rating: 7.7/ 10
7. Blade Runner (1982)
IMDB Rating: 8.1/10
8. The Matrix (1999)
The Matrix is easily one of the best movies ever made. Morpheus directly questions the nature of reality itself. The film is endlessly debatable. We were already becoming overly reliant on machines, which now control everything we do. In The Matrix, human beings become the fuel for machines, after hubris leads us to block out the sun. Intriguingly, the AI is unsympathetic, yet wholeheartedly interested in survival. This extraordinarily ambitious story is uniquely large in scale, both visually and thematically.
IMDB Rating: 7.2/10
9. Robot and Frank (2012)
Frank is an aging con whose son leaves him with a care robot. The duo then go on to become accomplices with Frank teaching the robot how to pick locks. The helper robot reluctantly agrees, but eventually draws the line and Frank agrees to quit after one last career-crowning heist.
IMDB Rating: 7.1/10
10. Metropolis (1927)
Metropolis is a cult classic among viewers who appreciate artificial intelligence in movies. It is a silent German expressionist movie where a robot aims to take over a city. Metropolis is one of the early portrayals of AI in movies and it has inspired many filmmakers to make movies with a similar trope. While Metropolis might not be appealing to everyone, the 1927 movie was undoubtedly way ahead of its time.
IMDB Rating: 8.3/10
11. The Social Dilemma (2020)
The Social Dilemma consists of interviews with ex-employees of major social media platforms who helped shape social media as we know it today. The documentary sheds light on how AI algorithms are used to analyze your data and build an online profile to serve you better ads and recommendations. While a tech-savvy individual might feel the narration to be a little exaggerated, the documentary has an appeal that is easily digestible for a mass audience.
IMDB Rating: 7.6/10
12. Moon (2009)
Moon makes it on our list because of the fascinating dynamic portrayed between a human and AI. The protagonist is a contract-based employee working for Lunar Industries, a company with a research facility on the Moon. Just when his three-year contract is about to end, he faces communication problems to the Earth and his interaction gets limited to GERTY, his AI companion. It is one of the best artificial intelligence movies on this list.
IMDB Rating: 7.9/10
13. Tau (2018)
Explore what happens when a woman is trapped in a futuristic smart house with Tau, an advanced artificial intelligence system eponymous to the movie title. The leading cast in Tau includes Maika Monroe, Ed Skrein, and Gary Oldman who show the reality of living in an experimental facility with an AI controlling every action.
IMDB Rating: 5.8/10
14. Transcendence (2014)
Transcendence is a sci-fi thriller that starts with scientist Will Caster’s partner and wife Evelyn going a step ahead and uploading Will’s consciousness into a quantum computer when his life is threatened. How Will chooses to live in his new virtual form is what drives the storyline from here. Transcendence may seem like a cliché selection to some, yet it is one of the best movies ever made on artificial intelligence.
IMDB: 6.3/10
15. Tron: Legacy (2010)
Tron: Legacy is the sequel to the popular 1982 sci-fi adventure movie Tron. Following his father’s disappearance, the protagonist manages to discover and enter the digital world created by his father. Interestingly, his father has been trapped in there for over 20 years and his AI clone rules the movie’s digital world.
IMDB Rating: 6.8/10
16. Lo And Behold: Reveries of the Connected World (2016)
While this isn’t an AI movie, Lo And Behold: Reveries of the Connected World explores the impact of AI, IoT as well as the internet in general. The documentary has interviews of influential personalities from the tech space, including Elon Musk, Bob Kahn, Sebastian Thrun and Ted Nelson. For those looking for an educational yet engaging documentary, Lo and Behold will not disappoint.
IMDB Rating: 7.0/10
17. Superintelligence (2020)
Superintelligence shows what happens when a superior AI chooses an ordinary human being with a hidden motive of taking over the world. While this is not a realistic portrayal of Artificial Intelligence, it could be a light-hearted watch. Melissa McCarthy plays the lead role, while James Corden is the voice of superintelligence.
IMDB Rating: 5.4/10
18. I am Mother (2019)
I am Mother explores a dystopian reality where a robot raises a teenage girl in an attempt to repopulate the earth with humans after extinction. While the daughter unaware of the reality initially, begins to notice anomalies when a power failure affects the Mother robot. The daughter then meets another woman and the incidents thereafter shape the story of this artificial intelligence-backed sci-fi thriller.
IMDB Rating: 6.7/10
19. Chappie (2015)
Chappie is set in a future where police robots oversee law and order in the city. One such robot is Chappie, who gets stolen and reprogrammed with the ability to feel and think. Starring Sharlto Copley, Dev Patel, Hugh Jackman, Chappie is a must-watch if are looking for an artificial intelligence movie where a robot can feel emotions like a human.
IMDB Rating: 6.8/10
20. Singularity (2017)
The movie explores how a robotics company creates a supercomputer to end wars in the world. However, things go wrong when the AI robot decides that humanity is the biggest threat to the world and vows to destroy humans. Fast forward 97 years, we see only a few humans survive while hiding from the robot army. The story development is a little slow, so this movie might not be for everyone.
