Subservience | Film Review

While struggling with a sick wife and two children, Nick (Michele Morrone) hires an AI android called Alice (Megan Fox) to help out around the house. But when Alice becomes self-aware, Nick finds that he and his family are suddenly in danger.

I've watched a few AI-based horror movies in the last month or so, so I was in the mood to give another one a shot. As I'd somewhat enjoyed the others, I thought I'd like this one too.

Unfortunately, I didn't like this one much at all.

For a start (and this is my fault as I've already mentioned seeing a few films with this concept recently) but the AI-gone-bad premise is no longer new. And when a film uses the concept but doesn't bring any new ideas, it starts feeling a bit stale. This one didn't really have anything new to add to that conversation, and so it didn't feel original.

Having said that, I did like that it got right into the story straight away. We know the family, we know their circumstances, we know how they acquired Alice and Alice has already moved in, all in the first 5 minutes of the film!

However, the film moving that quickly at the beginning meant that we never really get to know the characters on a deeper level. And so when things start to go wrong, it's harder to root for them than it would be if we felt connected to them.

But as we get further into the film, it makes sense that we didn't get to know the characters earlier - because they're all bland and void of any personality. Even the older child is mostly just used as a prop and isn't given as much to do as she could have been.

And with that, the performances are also a bit flat. I don't know if this is because of the acting, or because of the way the film is written, but none of the characters, or their dialogue, felt completely believable.

In the last 30 minutes of the film it occurred to me that I could turn it off and have absolutely no curiosity about how it would end. I just didn't really care.

And while I thought the ending was fine, it wasn't enough to save the rest of the film.

So overall, there are AI-gone-bad movies that are a lot better than this one. So if you're in the mood for that premise, check out something else. I'd personally recommend something fun like M3GAN!

3/10