For the longest time, I felt disconnected from this film. Alienated. I thought it felt cold and removed, emotionless like a Vulcan had directed a human drama. And I was puzzled that it has gotten so many good reviews. But then something happens almost in the last fifteen minutes that opened it up, made me see finally with better eyes.

The film is set in a near future where techno-sapients exist… basically humanoid robots who live with families for whatever reason. In this case, Yang (the robot) is brought into the home to help the Chinese adopted daughter of Colin Farrell and Jodie-Turner Smith. But Yang breaks down and the film becomes a quest to figure out how to repair… or preserve… him.

I was rather bothered with the world building of the film. It looks pretty contemporary only with robots… but we never really know how human the robots are, whether they exist as third class citizens or, indeed, if they have any rights or expectation of thought, creativity, or an inner life.

But by the end of the film, I realized I was asking the wrong questions, being too literal. This isn’t a Three Laws of Robotics type thing, but simply about the nature of being, of memory, of what we leave behind. It doesn’t matter to what extent Yang had rights or an inner life, it only mattered what Yang meant to his family.

The final fifteen minutes were technically the only ones I really liked on first watch. And yet, in liking them, I realized I’d misread and misunderstood the rest of the film. Those fifteen minutes were beautiful and meaningful and sad and real and contemplative. What I had previously seen as cold and distant were actually scenes of simple existence and connection. A story not told to us, but experienced by us. It re-contextualized everything.

When credits rolled, I sat there just pondering what I’d watched and how I could have misread or misunderstood the film so much. In a weird way, it reminded me of the ending of Pig. Just an emotional weight almost out of nowhere.

Oh, and probably one of the best opening credits scenes ever. Definitely going into my mental book of great musical scenes in non-musical films. Choice.

So, yeah, this is a really interesting, really thoughtful, really meaningful movie that had to sneak up on me and slap me in the face to realize it. A real surprise. One that almost makes it worth having to re-up Showtime to get. Wow.

Score: 87