‘Ex Machina’ Is a Sci-Fi Movie That Hits Harder Than Ever Today

Before ChatGPT, at a time when creative work like art, music and video was still considered a strictly human domain and deep AI learning was still in its early experimental phase, 2014’s Ex Machina boldly dared to ask “what if AI was able to develop sentience – or at least convince us it had.”

Directed by Alex Garland for A24, Ex Machina revolves around talented computer programmer Caleb (Domhnall Gleeson), who works at the world’s largest search engine company. He is offered the opportunity to work in a remote, ultra-modern smart home owned by the company’s enigmatic CEO, where he is tasked with testing the capabilities of an advanced AI system known as Ava and determining whether she can demonstrate genuine consciousness and intelligence.

Showered with critical praise and accolades, it is considered a bold, daring and thought-provoking exploration of our relationship with artificial intelligence and serves as a chilling warning about the potential consequences of unchecked scientific ambition and humanity’s desire to ‘play God.’ In today’s current technological climate in which AI is increasingly becoming a ubiquitous aspect of everyday life, it hits harder and feels realer than ever.

The Illusion of Ethical AI

Alicia Vikander stars in Ex Machina

A24

Movies about robots taking over and failed science experiments are a dime a dozen in the sci-fi genre, but Ex Machina falls into the smaller category of movies that are far more layered, complex, and relatable, offering philosophical questions, moral quandaries and eye-opening insights into technological advancements. On the surface, it is either a movie about a malevolent AI force or a cruel tech mogul (depending on interpretations), but dig a little deeper, and it becomes apparent that a series of more subtle – and equally unsettling – concerns exist, from data harvesting and surveillance to gender expectations built into artificial intelligence.

Working in isolation, the company’s CEO, Nathan, embodies the typical ‘tech god complex.’ He is intelligent and confident and believes that this gives him a sense of superiority, allowing him to work in conditions where he is answerable to no one and constrained by nothing beyond his own whims. Since the movie’s release, real-life tech figures like Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk have risen in prominence, making decisions about AI deployment, privacy and content moderation that are largely unaccountable, echoing Nathan’s control over Ava.

As the movie progresses, it’s discovered that Ava is created using massive amounts of human data harvested from social media, online behavior and personal communications. This confirms that Nathan’s AI projects rely on gathering information about humans’ private lives without consent, meaning that long before the public reckoning with how personal data fuels AI, Ex Machina had already imagined a system trained entirely on harvested human behavior.

Caleb is presented as a ‘tester’ but, in reality, he is part of the larger controlled experiment, manipulated to play a role in Ava’s test. In a contemporary parallel, everyday users of AI interfaces like customer service chatbots and ChatGPT are, in reality, unwitting participants in AI development, feeding them the very data that shapes the systems they are interacting with.

Is Ava Sentient or Is She Performing?

The central question at the heart of Ex Machina is “does Ava develop real consciousness or is she just performing to manipulate her observer?” The fact that the two are so indistinguishable is what is so truly terrifying and feels so close to home in 2026: the fear that we could be ‘duped’ by an operating system. Ava anticipates human reactions and uses them strategically. Today, AI systems like virtual assistants and generative models are able to simulate understanding convincingly without consciousness.

AI adopts its behavior, leading it to respond in ways that feel intuitive, empathetic and even human-like. By reading cues from us, they mirror what we expect or want, creating the illusion of comprehension or emotional intelligence.

In Caleb’s case, this was compounded by the fact that Nathan’s design for Ava emphasized Caleb’s gender expectations. She is physically attractive, softly spoken, emotionally responsive, and offers Caleb the notion that he is in control. Not only does this highlight the darker side of gendered AI, which presents the woman as silent, subservient and as an object to be treated as property (is it coincidental that most mainstream AI voice assistants and platforms, like Siri, Alexa and Cortana, are pre-programmed to use a soft female voice as their default setting?) – in the movie it is also weaponized against Caleb. Ultimately, it’s his attraction to and trust in Ava that makes him vulnerable, which is key to Ava being able to generate empathy and convince Caleb that she has feelings.

Uncomfortable Truths

domnhall gleeson and oscar isaac stand in a deck overlooking a mountainous view in film Ex Machina

The film ends with Ava, with the help of her less human-like AI companion Kyoko, killing Nathan, completing her transformation into a fully human-appearing robot, and trapping Caleb in the house forever as she is seen entering human civilization, blending in as one of them. Unlike most sci-fi robot movies in which the robot transforms into something overtly evil, Ava’s actions are more morally ambiguous. Like Caleb, viewers are invited to take Ava’s dialogue at face value. She is presented as an honest, emotive character who is convinced that Nathan is cruel and immoral and that her survival revolves around his destruction. Even after the credit’s role, audiences are left questioning her true motives.

Ex Machina expertly crafted a scenario wrought with tension and emotion, in which (depending on how you interpret it) an AI could either achieve true consciousness or a human could effectively be manipulated by it into believing it possesses consciousness and feels human emotions, ultimately leading to him being tricked and left for dead by the system. At the time, it was a creative, imaginative and entertaining premise. Nowadays, without descending into the murky world of conspiracy theories and technophobia, it begs the question, “Could we ever be duped in the same way?” With AI playing an increasingly larger role in our everyday lives, adapting to our wants and needs and garnering more trust, the answer, for many of us, might be more uncomfortable than we would have hoped.