‘Mother / Android’ portrays the most emotional part of the Rise of the Machines in a modest Netflix sci-fi drama

Chloë Grace Moretz effortlessly makes a film shine that would not have much appeal without her. The one that was surprising childhood revelation in ‘Kick-Ass’ This part has been seen for some time in films that revolve around its facility to provide us with close characters and of a certain complexity, in films sometimes worse (the ‘Tom and Jerry’ bassinet) and sometimes better (the fantastic ‘Hidden Passenger’, one of the great surprises of 2021).

Here she alone saves a film that would be a bit more uphill without her presence. It is a modest feature film that Hulu premiered in the United States and that Netflix has acquired for international distribution. No wonder, because has not a few attractive ingredients: a protagonist with hook and prestige, the fashionable post-apocalyptic notes and the old and always effective rebellion of the machines, a science fiction trope of which we never tire.

Chloë Grace Moretz da vida en ‘Mother / Android‘to Georgia, a young woman who finds out she’s pregnant the day the artificial intelligence rebellion breaks out In the very near future: Androids serve in the houses, but without warning they begin to unleash chaos. Nine months later, about to give birth, she tries to get to Boston in the company of the child’s father, where they have heard that ships are leaving in the direction of Korea, where humanity is resisting.

As it is easy to deduce, ‘Mother / Android’ is not too interested in the conflict between humans and robots unleashed, is not a reflection on the ethical problems of artificial intelligences, but a drama in which the protagonist tries to save herself and her baby. Along the way he makes a note about the contrast between pure humanity (the possibility of reproducing ourselves by natural methods) and the ruthless behavior of machines.

The end of the world and nine months

Clearly, ‘Mother / Android’ is not interested in the more technical part of the story: newcomer Mattson Tomlin, who wrote ‘Project Power’ also for Netflix, was inspired by a story about a woman who had to give birth together. to his partner in the middle of the Romanian revolution of 1989. The hostile environment in what we universally understand as a particularly delicate moment it is a good basis for a story on the edge.

However, the suspense and action part is the least lucid of the film. There is a moment that draws on the apocalypse stories “with limitations” that we so often see from a time to this part from ‘A Quiet Place’, here with the obligation to maintain total silence, as in the John Krasinski film. Despite some disturbing image (Androids light up their eyes, in a hint of very nice old school ci-fi), we have already seen it on other occasions.

But nevertheless, When the film connects the spaces between human drama and rogue machines, it does produce some exhilarating result. The best, without a doubt, is the encounter with Arthur, a disturbing computer engineer who seems to have lost his mind after the apocalypse and who helps Georgia in her time of need. The subplot related to this character is undoubtedly the most disconcerting and suggestive, the one of purest science fiction (with mentions of Karel Capek’s seminal ‘RUR’) and the one that suggests what this film would have been like with a sensitivity more akin to gender.

The whole, however, is very attractive: the presence of Chloë Grace Moretz, capable of taking his most melodramatic side out for a walk without the film destabilizing, and some specific script idea (the initial discovery that she is pregnant, including a youth tragedy, and that it is relativized in a very short time) gives personality to a bitter and intense film. Maybe too much at times.