3 computer nerds are dragged almost against their will to some sweaty room in Laos to run some secret operation by some military tough guy.
The operation involves dropping 4 AI robo soldiers in a village in Laos that is controlled by a drug cartel. Things are off to a bad start when the chute of robot 4 doesn't open so he crashes. The other 3 are off to the village.
Problem is by now some ridiculous medical students in the area got lost and ended up in the village where a navy SEAL deserter lives and tries to help them out and protect them from the violent drug lords.
Meanwhile some village kids discover robot 4 and steal its module--the very module which allows our nerds to control it, or destroy it if necessary. Robot 4 of course wakes up just fine and without the module is basically a free AI.
Tough guy reports to a guy in the Pentagon who orders two robots go after robot 4 and the other go into the village where it shoots up everything and our dumb students + the SEAL + the kid have to try and escape and survive. Pentagon guy is in contact with corporate guy who owns the robot enterprise.
The whole operation is now thoroughly fubar, since you have scores of witnesses and a rogue robot. Not to mention that our nerds are starting to get unhappy since they didn't sign up for their robots to be out there killing civilians and start fighting amongst themselves.
The idea now is for tough guy to install an upgraded module in Robot 3 so it will destroy robot 4. Additionally tough guy has an EMP device with him to neutralize whatever robots are nearby. Turns out the upgraded module gives robot 3 also the ability to speak. Pentagon guy has some tricks up his sleeve as well in case it all goes to heck.
In any case, robot 4 ends up with robot 3's module. And when faced with humans, starts asking questions. Not just any questions, but deep philosophical ones. "What am I?" "What is life"
In the intro we are told that thousands of corporations are working on AI for the purpose of getting lucrative government contracts. Thus this movie gets at the core of the AI issue. It's not about chatting with cute bots, or what jobs will be lost. It's about what will happen when governments militarize AI.
And this movie presents on such in instance. The robots here are cool. So is the little violence and gore. The government/corporate interaction is intriguing. The nerds while mildly annoying are interesting as well as they face their own moral dilemmas. But the problem of course is everyone else starting with the obnoxious medical students. More could have been done here with the drug lords, they don't get enough attention.
Overall quite a debut for multitasker writer director etc. Toia who does a great job directing the foreigners, especially the kids, but not so much directing the insufferable students. There's a lot going in this movie and it's unnecessarily long, 20 minutes could have easily been cut and that budget directed to more action. Most importantly this movie is very timely and asks the right questions, questions that no one else will ask.
The operation involves dropping 4 AI robo soldiers in a village in Laos that is controlled by a drug cartel. Things are off to a bad start when the chute of robot 4 doesn't open so he crashes. The other 3 are off to the village.
Problem is by now some ridiculous medical students in the area got lost and ended up in the village where a navy SEAL deserter lives and tries to help them out and protect them from the violent drug lords.
Meanwhile some village kids discover robot 4 and steal its module--the very module which allows our nerds to control it, or destroy it if necessary. Robot 4 of course wakes up just fine and without the module is basically a free AI.
Tough guy reports to a guy in the Pentagon who orders two robots go after robot 4 and the other go into the village where it shoots up everything and our dumb students + the SEAL + the kid have to try and escape and survive. Pentagon guy is in contact with corporate guy who owns the robot enterprise.
The whole operation is now thoroughly fubar, since you have scores of witnesses and a rogue robot. Not to mention that our nerds are starting to get unhappy since they didn't sign up for their robots to be out there killing civilians and start fighting amongst themselves.
The idea now is for tough guy to install an upgraded module in Robot 3 so it will destroy robot 4. Additionally tough guy has an EMP device with him to neutralize whatever robots are nearby. Turns out the upgraded module gives robot 3 also the ability to speak. Pentagon guy has some tricks up his sleeve as well in case it all goes to heck.
In any case, robot 4 ends up with robot 3's module. And when faced with humans, starts asking questions. Not just any questions, but deep philosophical ones. "What am I?" "What is life"
In the intro we are told that thousands of corporations are working on AI for the purpose of getting lucrative government contracts. Thus this movie gets at the core of the AI issue. It's not about chatting with cute bots, or what jobs will be lost. It's about what will happen when governments militarize AI.
And this movie presents on such in instance. The robots here are cool. So is the little violence and gore. The government/corporate interaction is intriguing. The nerds while mildly annoying are interesting as well as they face their own moral dilemmas. But the problem of course is everyone else starting with the obnoxious medical students. More could have been done here with the drug lords, they don't get enough attention.
Overall quite a debut for multitasker writer director etc. Toia who does a great job directing the foreigners, especially the kids, but not so much directing the insufferable students. There's a lot going in this movie and it's unnecessarily long, 20 minutes could have easily been cut and that budget directed to more action. Most importantly this movie is very timely and asks the right questions, questions that no one else will ask.