In the last year, AI has gone from a niche fascination to an inescapable cultural debate as advocates claim it will democratize the creative industries, replace therapy, and ultimately fulfill the need for human interaction entirely as critics ask why on earth we would want to do that. Nevertheless, tools like ChatGPT and Replika have become wildly popular for their ability to reproduce what seems like realistic human conversation built on an algorithm trained largely on noticing which words are often used next to each other. While artificial intelligence has been a staple of science fiction for over a century, this recent proliferation of AI technology casts a large shadow over the genre, something that Garth Davis’ Foe seems to be aware of, as much of its plot revolves around the repetitive, mechanical process of training an AI model to sound, act, and ultimately think like a real person.
However, repetitive and mechanical is unfortunately the central idea behind Foe. The film, starring Paul Mescal and Saoirse Ronan as Midwestern couple as Junior and Hen, is set largely within the domestic space as government agent Terrance (Aaron Pierre) works to produce an AI replica of Mescal’s Junior to act as companion for his wife while he is on a long, exploratory space mission. This context swiftly disappears into the background as the film clunks into place as a universal drama about a comfortable marriage interrupted by a charismatic stranger with some big questions. The rest of Foe settles into a fairly consistent pattern of interviews and moments of explosive ambiguity that suggest something grander under the surface, with Junior becoming increasingly jealous and unsettled as these interrogations cut deeper into his psyche. It’s a simple setup, though one that could be easily imbued with compelling drama if it really challenged its protagonists or their conceptions of their relationship.
Unfortunately, these characters don’t have much of a worldview or perspective to be upended. Certainly, they seem to care for each other and occasionally want more out of their lives, but it rarely felt like either character experienced any sort of desire until the film’s climax suggests you might have been looking for it in the wrong place — though remains unavailable to define it as anything but an ambiguous yearning for being somewhere else. While the cast are as good as one would expect from this trio, it’s often hard to identify what it’s in service of, although there are moments of electricity when a focus peaks through. One of the film’s biggest moments comes as Junior is pushed to a moment of reflection on the meaninglessness of his own life and finds the answer not in quiet submission, but in rage.
To its credit, the film is seemingly aware of the hollowness at its core. The house where the vast majority of the film is set is profoundly isolated, suggesting Junior and Hen as something closer to castaways. This is all captured wonderfully, with the film finding a quiet, muted visual language that leaves you frantically searching for the same fragments of life and change as its characters. The film is adapted from a novel by I’m Thinking of Ending Things author Iain Reade (who co-wrote the script), and while it does not veer so far into surrealism as that novel does, there is occasionally a compelling sense of this house as more of a metaphorical space than a literal one, though this eventually clashes with the film’s attempts to ask us to invest ourselves in its characters as three-dimensional beings.
Although Foe initially left me cold, I found myself wanting to get more out of it; I liked the ending, it contains some very talented actors giving technically impressive performances, and trusted friends had come out of it feeling differently. Unfortunately, reflection was not kind to it. While I perhaps unearthed more moments that had moved me, I didn’t actually find myself liking it any more. I think this, more than anything, highlights how the film let me down: on the surface, it promises some kind of intellectual or emotional debate but doesn’t actually leave any lingering questions. Its real ending, of which there are at least five, is incredibly literal and feels interested largely in not leaving an audience confused. It’s an admirable goal, but at least confusion is a feeling.
