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Throughout the 2010s, and continuing into the 2020s, massive corporate-backed IP has dominated the domestic box office and the American journalistic conversation about cinema in general. We live in a world where reporters, when they had the chance to sit down with Martin Scorsese to discuss new masterpieces like “The Silence” or “The Wolf of Wall Street,” decided to ask him about Captain America and his place in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Vocal detractors of the dominant paradigm repeatedly shouted that Hollywood should devote more time and resources to new ideas. After all, why be the next “Star Wars” when you can be the first of something different? Where, where did the original sci-fi/fantasy ideas come from?
But then, when an ambitious filmmaker tries to make something new and impressive for a wide cinematic audience, it generally backfires. Audiences seemed more eager to associate themselves with a recognizable corporate product than they were to explore new mythos, new characters, or new science fiction concepts. Films like “Strange World” or “Gemini Man” or “Gods of Egypt” are rejected by audiences, and even films based on known literature – “A Wrinkle in Time,” “Mortal Engines, “”Valerian and the City of a Thousand”. Planets” – crashed and burned. There’s nothing wilder or weirder in those movies than what one might see in an MCU movie, but without an IP, audiences stayed away.
We want original ideas, but reject them when they come. Even if some of the above films are bad, clumsy, too generic, or too weird by half, their original visuals and ambitious concepts should at least be discussed and celebrated more openly. Ambitious misconceptions are more interesting than a successful pabulum.
Among the victims of arbitrary audience was Gareth Edwards’ 2023 science fiction epic “The Creator,” a sci-fi film made from an anime about the genocide of mankind against robots. The film was made for a relatively modest $80 million, but only earned back about $104 million. 15 months since its release, however, audiences are discovering “The Creator” on Prime Video.
The Creator is finally receiving positive attention
The setting for “The Creator” is timely. By 2055, humanity will allow AI to take over most aspects of its infrastructure. In doing so, however, he allowed AI to inexplicably (accidentally?) detonate a nuclear bomb in the middle of Los Angeles. In response, humanity enacted a vicious, militant, anti-AI campaign, and several nations banded together to form an ultra-violent global anti-robot task force to assassinate them all. It’s now 2070, and the world is also regularly surrounded by menacing, hawk-like scanning vessels—the USS NOMAD—that can detect where any robots might be hiding.
This is, of course, a stark ethical dilemma, as robots have become self-aware, and many have realistic human faces. In fact, robots have become so sophisticated, they have formed their own cultures and religions. Killing robots is now just military genocide. The military forces hope to find and assassinate the one called Nirmata (the Nepali word for “creator”), as rumors spread that Niramata has created a superweapon that destroys NOMAD.
However, the weapon in question is Alpha-O (Madeleine Yuna Voyles), a young child robot with a peaceful demeanor and a child-like understanding of the world. Most of “The Creator” will see the main character of the film, a soldier named Sgt. Taylor (John David Washington), escorts Alpha-O (or “Alphie”) through dangerous territory as he rethinks his philosophy of life.
The concepts in “The Creator” are ambitious, and Edwards offered a few provocative concepts folded into his simple science fiction story. The idea that robots have formed their own belief system is fascinating, and Edwards would have been smarter to focus on it, rather than stopping to have a military mass shooting. At the end of the day, it’s a pretty simple metaphor for acceptance and peace. “Star Trek” lite, if you will.
There is much to discuss, both positive and negative, about The Creator
Of course, one of the reasons “The Creator” is doing so well on Prime Video may be because of its negative talking points as well. It’s certainly going to start some conversations. While Edwards’ film ultimately emerges as a drama about acceptance, and the horrors of military action inspired by xenophobia, it also seems to send a subtly unsavory message about AI.
Some audience members may be old enough to remember movies where AI robots were seen as a dangerous threat to humanity (see: “The Terminator,” “Alien,” many others), so it strange to see a film like “The Creator” where AI is depicted as something elegant, humane, and worthy of protection. It can’t be a coincidence that a major studio release, owned by the Disney corporation, tries to depict AI as something gentle and helpful in the year 2023. Could “The Creator” be corporate propaganda? Is it trying to soften audiences to the idea of all-pervasive and harmless AI just so that real-life AI investors can continue to develop the technology for their own purposes?
/Rafael Motamayor reviewed the film himself “The Creator,” and he said the movie was cool … but not very good. Many critics lambasted the simplicity of his ideas, and some were even offended. On Film Freak Central, critic Walter Chaw he came down hard on Edwards for his fetishization of Asian cultures, and his clumsy use of Vietnam War imagery. Too many white filmmakers, Chaw wrote, use Asian bodies as fodder for Western spiritual navel-gazing.
Are people attracted to the cool visuals of “The Creator?” It’s science fiction ideas lurking deep inside it? Its problematic existence as a pro-tech corporate tool? It’s confusing imagery? Whatever brings people in, the film is now being discovered more widely than ever before. Perhaps the conversation and deconstruction will continue.
