25 Years Ago, Steven Spielberg Helped Predict The Debate Society Is Having Today

It has been 25 years since Steven Spielberg directed one of the most polarizing movies of his career, and helped predict a debate that is raging on in society to this day. Spielberg remains one of the most popular and successful film directors in history, and while Spielberg has several movies that historians rank among the best of all time, he also has some that people felt let down by. However, nothing split audiences like his 2001 release A.I. Artificial Intelligence.

The biggest problem with A.I. Artificial Intelligence has nothing to do with the controversy surrounding AI today. At that time in history, AI was mostly science fiction, and while it did exist in the world, it wasn’t something that normal people had easy access to. As a result, it was a great idea for dystopian movies and fiction, and that is how A.I. Artificial Intelligence originated. One of cinema’s best speculative directors, Stanley Kubrick, turned his attention to it.

However, sadly, Kubrick died in 1999 with the movie unfinished. Steven Spielberg agreed to finish the movie for his friend, but this is where things ended up getting complicated. Kubrick is a filmmaker who sees the darkness in the world and explores what is hidden in the shadows. That works well for the fears of AI, even in 2001. However, Spielberg sees the light in the world, and his movies show wonder and awe, the opposite of everything Kubrick’s films represent.

Steven Spielberg And Stanley Kubrick Helped Predict AI Problems 25 Years Ago

On June 29, 2001, Steven Spielberg’s A.I. Artificial Intelligence hit theaters. The movie only had Spielberg’s name as the director and screenwriter, and the story credit goes to Brian Aldiss for the short story “Supertoys Last All Summer Long.” However, Spielberg said from the start that he wanted to help bring Kubrick’s vision to the big screen. That said, what resulted was a mishmash of Kubrick’s eye for horror and Spielberg’s eye for a happily ever after ending.

However, what also exists is something that is driving arguments and debates 25 years later. This is a movie about a child created using AI who is programmed to experience love. Played by Haley Joel Osment, he is given to Monica Swinton (Frances O’Connor) and her husband, Henry (Sam Robards), whose son, Martin, is in suspended animation after contracting a rare disease.

The idea of programming David to experience love is a gift, but it is also a curse. David is not a real boy, and unlike Pinocchio, he will never be a real boy. This means he is destined to experience heartbreak and can never find peace. What does it mean to be human? In the Ridley Scott movie Blade Runner, the film shows that there are automatons that understand what it means to be human more than humans do. AI tries to do the same.

In 2026, the biggest debate is over AI and how it might be ruining the world. There are people who use AI and speak to it like it is a human, some even developing strange relationships with their specific AI partners. This seems strange to many people, but as A.I. Artificial Intelligence shows, it is not new. It is slightly weird to want to see David be a real boy, but that is the magic of movies. What is weird and divisive in real life is accepted on the big screen.

A.I. Was A Strange Blending Of Two Different Filmmakers’ Styles

The biggest problem with A.I. Artificial Intelligence is the merging of Kubrick’s almost nihilistic look at the world and Spielberg’s eternal optimism. The movie was a small success, making $235.9 million on a budget between $90-100 million. Its critical score was decent, at 76%, but its audience score was lower at 64%. What threw people off was the mishmash of styles.

The movie has a lot of Kubrick’s filmmaking tendencies, with the horror of David being an AI and the realization that he will never be a real boy. This is dark, and it is something that shows the true horror of trying to create life. However, Spielberg also tacks on moments of optimism and even gives David the closest he can to a happily-ever-after ending. Kubrick never would have gone with a happy ending, but Spielberg couldn’t help himself.

This shows the real difference between Kubrick and Spielberg. In a Kubrick movie, the director rejects sentimentality and prefers to look at the stories in a chilly, analytical style. In a film like A Clockwork Orange, he wants to understand what society does that creates the droogs, and then he sets them loose to be as wild as they can be. Even in Spielberg’s alien movies, he wants to show there is hope, and creates warm stories that survive despite the world’s mechanisms. Neither side really blended well together in this movie.

A.I. Artificial Intelligence Remains A Polarizing Movie

That brings the idea that the audience score was much lower than the critical analysis. While critics were able to see what Spielberg did with a Kubrick idea and left the movie impressed, audiences were either confused or, in some cases, outright angry. The confusion comes with the audience wondering how they are supposed to feel about David and his desire to be a real boy. Should they feel horror or optimism? The movie never draws a line to tell them what to think.

However, the anger comes mostly from the Kubrick faithful. When Kubrick released a new movie, his audience knew what to expect, which was a detached, methodical look at what was always an interesting, deep topic. There was no false sense of happily-ever-after, and Kubrick went in a direction where he tried to find the logical place the story would go in real life. Spielberg doesn’t do that, and it angered Kubrick’s faithful audience to see the sentimentality at the end of the film.

The irony here is that it is the same anger Stephen King fans had for Kubrick when he made changes to The Shining to eliminate the actual horror of the hotel and instead made it about a man who is already broken. With A.I. Artificial Intelligence, Steven Spielberg did something similar to a Kubrick story, and it works as an experiment in filmmaking, although it will always remain a polarizing and sometimes misunderstood sci-fi film.

Release Date

June 29, 2001

Runtime

146 Minutes