EX MACHINA with Michael Tucker

Can you imagine a world where the lines between human and artificial intelligence blur beyond recognition? Join us and special guest Michael Tucker, creator of Lessons from the Screenplay and host of Beyond the Screenplay, as we delve into the mesmerizing world of "Ex Machina." Together, we dissect the film’s sleek storytelling, stunning cinematography, and complex themes, uncovering the nuanced layers that make this film a gripping exploration of consciousness and human interaction with AI.

We explore how the film's unique blend of thriller and sci-fi elements creates a cozy yet sinister atmosphere, enhancing the emotional journey of the protagonist, Caleb. This episode reveals how our understanding and engagement with "Ex Machina" evolves with repeated viewings and personal growth. Reflecting on how advancements in AI, like ChatGPT, influence our current perceptions of the film, we discuss its poignant and perhaps even prophetic insights into human-AI relationships. We also dive into the psychological and philosophical ramifications of AI creation and manipulation, drawing comparisons to similar themes in other media like "Black Mirror."

Michael Tucker shares his expert insights into the efficient and strategic storytelling of "Ex Machina," celebrating Alex Garland's directorial debut. We touch on the collaborative nature of filmmaking, comparing it to video game development, and ponder the challenges of adapting such a narrative into an interactive medium. From humorous anecdotes to deep technical breakdowns, this episode promises a thorough and engaging exploration for fans of the film and those fascinated by the intersection of cinema and artificial intelligence.

Notey Notes:

Lessons From The Screenplay

Beyond The Screenplay

Ex Machina script

Transcript

Taylor D. Adams: 0:00

Hey folks, just a quick heads up that all episodes of the Film Nuts podcast contain heavy spoilers and some strong language. Nothing too crazy, but make sure there's no one with sensitive ears too close by. And if you like what you hear today, please consider becoming a patron of the show. You can find links to that page in the show notes or you can visit patreoncom slash film nuts. Okay, Anyway, please enjoy the show and thank you so much for listening.

Clip: 0:24

I'm sorry, I don't understand.

Michael Tucker: 0:28

You shouldn't trust him, you shouldn't trust anything he says.

Clip: 0:38

Power restored.

Michael Tucker: 0:39

Ex Machina is one of those movies that, for whatever reason, just like presses all my buttons. The cinematography and just the vibe of the movie I really like. Like it's sleek but kind of warm and fuzzy and around the edges it's sexy, it's cool, it's a little playful, it's a little dangerous. It has kind of all of the things that I like to have in movies in one big package.

Taylor D. Adams: 1:08

Hi, I'm Taylor and welcome back to the Film Nuts podcast, a show about why we love what we watch. I am so excited for today's episode for two reasons. It's with someone whose work I've followed and admired for a long time, and our film today is rife for discussion both from the technical and emotional sides of filmmaking. A gorgeously well-crafted movie that asks the audience thought-provoking questions like what is consciousness? Does the act of creation make us gods and are robots hot? I'm talking about 2014's Ex Machina. Written and directed by Alex Garland, this moody and cerebral sci-fi story is both a film designed to entertain as well as make us, as the audience, active participants, at least according to my guest today.

Taylor D. Adams: 2:01

Michael Tucker is the creator of the YouTube channel Lessons from the Screenplay and host of the podcast Beyond the Screenplay both projects that break down writing in film, television and even video games. And in addition to these story-focused projects, michael is also a narrative designer in the gaming industry. So he's, you know, got credentials. Michael and I chat about what it's like being a techno optimist what role AI could play for those processing grief, and could Ex Machina be turned into a video game. So let's tear up the dance floor. Here's Michael Tucker talking about Ex Machina on the Film Nuts podcast.

Michael Tucker: 2:40

I'm in a new house. It's very exciting. It's hard to become a homeowner right now, especially in California, especially in LA. So I feel very lucky to have found a house and I'm learning very quickly all the things that go along with buying and maintaining a house, like inspections and contractors. And you think you are going to get the dishwasher installed, but then it needs an electrician and then it needs this other thing.

Taylor D. Adams: 3:10

So it's crazy, but great Also. At the same time, have you fallen through the ceiling? Yet I have not fallen through the ceiling. Okay, um, my second day in my house, I fell through the ceiling.

Clip: 3:17

Uh.

Taylor D. Adams: 3:19

I misstepped in the attic and made a Taylor shaped hole in the ceiling.

Clip: 3:23

It was perfect Uh and I was like well.

Taylor D. Adams: 3:26

I was mad and I was like, well, let's just get it out of the way and then maybe from there things will get better, and now you have a great story about it.

Michael Tucker: 3:34

Yes exactly, exactly.

Taylor D. Adams: 3:36

Um, so yeah, like tell me all right. So, first of all, I've been following your work both from lessons from the screenplay and beyond screenplay for years now. I think it's really cool that we're having this conversation. Um, but give me kind of I know this is going to kind of a throwback and maybe you've been asked this question multiple times but give me kind of the impetus as to why you started these kind of uh, the this type of content, deep diving into how films are made and, specifically, how they're written.

Michael Tucker: 4:07

Yeah, the sort of shortest version of it is. I've always wanted to be a filmmaker. Since I was a kid I wanted to write and direct, but mostly I was focusing on the directing aspect. And so, making movies in high school and even college, I was mostly thinking about direction and cool camera angles and all the kind of fun, visible parts of filmmaking. And so when I moved to LA and started to do, you know, some shorts and commercials and we did a web series and started to get it in front of industry people, a lot of the feedback was along the lines of the direction is good and like clever ideas are here, but the writing isn't there. And so I had to hear that multiple, multiple times until finally it got through and I was like, oh, I never actually paid attention to what makes writing good, so my writing isn't good. Maybe I should do that if I want my writing to be good.

Michael Tucker: 5:09

And so that realization came around the same time that video essays were a very big thing, every painting, obviously nerd writer, et cetera. And so I just kind of had this idea of like, well, I want to read a bunch of screenplays to learn all the writing things and maybe I can do a blog where I summarize my findings. And as soon as I started writing my first blog post, I was like, oh no, this should be a video essay that will help other people get it and force me to internalize this, because in order to teach it, you have to understand it better. Internalize this, because in order to teach it, you have to understand it better. And so that was kind of the impetus for starting. Lessons from screenplay is like here's a way to force myself to read and analyze movies in depth, learn these lessons and then share it with people.

Michael Tucker: 5:58

And luckily it all kind of took off and was enough to become my full-time job for several years. So, uh, yeah. So that was kind of the beginning of the channel. And then, a couple years into that, as I was building out the team, I'd met a bunch of really cool also, uh, people that were into film analysis and nerds like me. They were helping write and edit the videos for the channel and we were like we like talking about movies, let's do a podcast. And it was like, well, yeah, but everyone says that. But it was like, but maybe this could be like you know. So we went for it and then that's been super fun, and so we've been doing that ever since too. So that's kind of the at the main thrust of the channels.

Taylor D. Adams: 6:39

That's awesome and okay, I I don't know if I'm making this up or if I'm right, but was the first video essay on Ex Machina.

Michael Tucker: 6:47

It wasn't, but it was an early one. So Gone Girl was the very first video. That's right. Ex Machina was like 11. For some reason that number like sticks out to me. I hope I'm right about that, but yeah, it was a very early video.

Taylor D. Adams: 7:02

I mean you made so many. It's totally fine if we don't remember the older things. I could have sworn for some reason. But yeah, gone Girl, that was a great one too. But that ruins my segue.

Michael Tucker: 7:16

But my segue is so why did you want to talk about Ex Machina? Ex Machina is one of those movies that, for whatever reason, just like presses all my buttons, like it just hits all of the sweet spots for me where it's this contained thriller with just a few characters. I love how simple the narrative is and it's all about trust and this kind of cat and mouse game of you know who's good, who's bad, who's a robot, who's not a robot. Like there's all these questions and you're leaning's good, who's bad, who's a robot, who's not a robot. Like there's all these questions and you're leaning forward and it's just like a couple people in this one location are you building an ai?

Clip: 7:53

I've already built one and over the next few days you're going to be the human component in the turing test. Holy shit, yeah, that's right, caleb, you got it, because if that test is passed, you are dead center of the greatest scientific event in the history of man. If you've created a conscious machine, it's not the history of man, that's the history of gods.

Michael Tucker: 8:20

And it's sci-fi. I'm a sci-fi nerd, so there's like those elements there and the cinematography and just the vibe of the movie I really like, like it's sleek but kind of warm and fuzzy and around the edges it's like it's sexy, it's cool, it's a little playful, it's a little dangerous, like it just it has kind of all of the things that I like to have in movies and one big package, and so I just immediately loved it when I saw it the first time.

Taylor D. Adams: 8:52

I think, I think the, as you were kind of going through the contrasting feelings of it I immediately thought of like cozy and sinister at the same time.

Taylor D. Adams: 9:01

Like that's kind of what it feels like watching this. At the same time, like that's kind of what it feels like watching this. Um, so you have a video essay about this movie. You've seen it multiple times. You have a podcast episode about this movie. This is one of your favorite movies of the 2010s. I assume you've seen it more than once. So with each, like, what was your reaction the first time you saw it? Do you remember? Like, who were you with? Who was Michael Tucker? Like what was going on?

Michael Tucker: 9:27

who were you with? Who was michael tucker, like what was going on? Yeah, so I do remember. Uh, I saw it with alex cayeros, one of our co-hosts at beyond the screenplay and who helps it's basically like my creative partner and all things filmmaking, um and I didn't know much about the movie. He, I think, was the one that was like it's this new a24 movie, it's gonna be cool, let's just go see it. And I was like okay, and so I went in pretty much blind and was pretty immediately swept up in it and just the whole time was waiting for it to be bad and it kept not being bad and just like kept being like more things that I wanted and so by the end, I was like that was amazing, like I really enjoyed that experience.

Michael Tucker: 10:04

I was not expecting that and, yeah, I feel like it was coming at a time when sort of my, my tastes were evolving.

Michael Tucker: 10:13

I've talked a lot about like being a big fincher fan and I think around this time was when I was starting to be like appetite, like fincher has like maybe too many control issues, like things in fincher world are a little bit too tight and a little too perfect, and I feel like this movie feels like that, but softened a little bit.

Michael Tucker: 10:34

So the the filmmaking, the shots are still precise and there's intention behind it, but it's also a little bit more loose and organic and so, yeah, taste wise, it just felt like, oh, this is like the new thing that I want to pursue. So, yeah, first time I was super, super into it and, yes, as you said, I've seen it many times since then and, in making the video essay, watched it over and over again and read the screenplay, analyzed it, but haven't really watched it start to finish for, and read the screenplay, analyzed it, uh, but haven't really watched it start to finish for a couple years now, and so part of why I wanted to talk about it was to force myself to revisit it now, start to finish, and kind of see what was different and what my reactions would be to it after all this time.

Taylor D. Adams: 11:24

So what are your reactions to it after seeing it for the millionth time, or whatever?

Michael Tucker: 11:29

Yeah, I still really really like it. It's interesting. I feel like there's kind of been this arc with it of like it was great and then maybe people were poking at it and like, even in our podcast episode that we recorded for beyond the screenplay, I didn't feel like we really got to have a full conversation about it. Like we sort of touched on a certain couple of issues but landed in some conclusions about like caleb and what the movie was saying, that I like wasn't quite sure that I agreed with 100%, and so watching it again, I kind of still have the same feelings of like I think there's lots of room for interpretation of a lot of things, and that's one of the things I like about the movie. And, rather than concluding, this is what it's saying, or that's what it's saying I'm arriving at. I think it's just putting some of these ideas out there for us to react to as an audience.

Michael Tucker: 12:29

The other thing I was curious about is our relationship with AI is so different than it was nine years ago when it came out, and so now we have chat, gpt and cloud and all these kind of LLMs where you can interact with an AI as if it were a person, and so I was wondering how it would feel visiting a movie about AI from nine years ago and in some ways it felt a little dated, even because I think the perception of what AI can be and how it can behave before these kind of chat models was this kind of more clinical, quiet, like I speak a little precisely and I move like this because I'm a robot and I think our relationship with AI is shaking that up and going to continue shaking that up. So it felt old in some ways, but I still really enjoyed the experience, still really love the performances. Especially Oscar Isaac is so great in this cinematography. All the things I loved about it I still love about it.

Taylor D. Adams: 13:43

I think that's really cool, that I mean this this movie happens to be about technology and the fact that since it's came out, like technology has just evolved exponentially. Like not a lot of movies are about something that ages as like time goes on. Some things are just about like a fixed moment, kind of history. Um, so, with your kind of reflection on it now is there, is there a part of you that has changed, I guess, from the first time you saw this, from the first time you saw this.

Michael Tucker: 14:05

Yes, I can't quite put a finger on what it is, though I think I'm a. I remember watching it the first time and kind of being seduced along with Caleb. Are you attracted to me? What Are you attracted to me? You give me indications that you are.

Clip: 14:26

I do yes. How Micro-expressions.

Michael Tucker: 14:30

Micro-expressions the way your eyes fix on my eyes and lips the way you hold my gaze, or don't do you think about me when we aren't together, like going on this journey of like oh, that's a robot, I don't really care about that robot, and then by the end being like I'm in love with ava, like yes, we gotta like rescue her not quite that two dimensional, but but essentially that and I feel like there was.

Michael Tucker: 15:10

I have more distance from that now and part of that is just seeing this movie so many times. But also, I think just being older that's something I've experienced when revisiting lots of movies is like seeing them, seeing a movie at different ages. You relate to different characters because you're sort of, you know, in different life phases and that kind of thing. And so I felt less swept up in Caleb's psychology this time and less vulnerable to that and more intrigued by, I guess, the greater, bigger questions that maybe, like Nathan was even struggling with of, like the creation of a new life form. Does Nathan know that if he succeeds it's going to mean that he's dying right Like? Does he know he's like rushing toward his own demise? Does he know he's like rushing toward his own demise? Like those kind of weightier questions. I think I was more intrigued and involved with this time than the first time I watched it.

Clip: 16:12

Ava was a rat in a maze and I gave her one way out To escape she'd have to use self-awareness, imagination, manipulation, sexuality, empathy, and she did. Now, if that isn't true, ai, what the fuck is? So my only function was to be someone she could use to escape. Yeah, and you didn't select me because I'm good at coding. No, well, no, I mean, you're okay, you're even pretty good. You selected me based on my search engine inputs.

Taylor D. Adams: 16:47

You obviously have an invested interest in this movie, as we've said. You've talked a lot about it on a lot of different platforms, seen it multiple times. Why do you think that this film is so ripe for discussion?

Michael Tucker: 17:05

I mean, there's so much going on in it, but what do you think about? It lends to so many revisits and discussions after the revisits. I think it's hits this kind of perfect in between of it's vague enough that you can wonder and ask questions like it doesn't quite answer everything, in a like wrapping it up with like a little bow in terms of like what this meant or what this person's intention really was. So there's room for people to discuss. Well, I think ava was doing this because of this reason, or I think ava really did love him or whatever. So I think there's there's enough room there for people to kind of project themselves into it and take you know, have different takes.

Michael Tucker: 17:44

I think the, the filmmaking, is also just really interesting.

Michael Tucker: 17:48

Like I, one of the reasons it was fun to make a video about this movie was the.

Michael Tucker: 17:54

The differences between the screenplay and the like final product were, um, there weren't a ton of them, but they were notable differences and so there was a lot, I think, kind of found in the editing of the movie and I feel like there are even these kind of montages that I I get the sense were created in the edit to kind of solve some problems and fill some holes and sometimes that can cause problems and take people out of it. I feel like in this movie it actually gives you room to stop and think about what's just happened and I think that is part of why, when the movie ends, I think a lot of people have like ideas in their heads or things they want to talk about, because they've had time to really like process and try to come to a conclusion about what they think was going on. So I think it's this right blend of vague and specific uh that I don't know engenders uh, generates conversation and makes people want to explore it more uh, do you think you could ever be tricked or seduced by AI?

Michael Tucker: 19:09

So I don't think so, especially not 38 year old Michael, maybe younger Michael, the one that saw this for the first time, maybe you know I was thinking about this question because I think it really depends on the situation. Where the situation in the movie, it's very clear that this thing is a robot. I think there is a reason that you would. It'd be easy to remind yourself that you're being manipulated. You're being manipulated if someone were to create an exact replica of a loved one of mine, such that I couldn't tell the difference, or they just had the same mannerisms and affect as someone that I already cared about. That, I think, is where the vulnerability would come in, because there's just you know it's a replica of someone.

Michael Tucker: 20:02

There's my mom as a robot form. I think they're gonna shoot her in the head. I don't know if it's really her or not, even if I know it's a robot. If it looks and acts just like my mom, I'm gonna like. There's an emotional reaction that you just as a like a base reptilian animal reaction, and I think that's one of the things I find so fascinating in this movie is that it's it's getting at like there are certain just primal things that we have as humans that can be manipulated. And so what happens when we make something that can tap directly into those primal things and and our programming essentially and use it against us?

Clip: 20:42

Yeah.

Taylor D. Adams: 20:43

That's funny. That reminds me of another Domino Gleason thing, the black mirror episode, where he is a physical AI recreation of his actual self. This is kind of weird, but if the technology ever advanced like that and, god forbid, something happens Michael Tucker's no longer with us Would you be okay with your loved ones resurrecting you as an AI being?

Michael Tucker: 21:09

um, that is a good question. I think my immediate response is if it helps them be happy, I want them to do whatever they need to do to be happy. Uh, I won't be around, so people can do whatever they want. I would never want to do that to replace a loved one. Um, but, yeah, I was thinking about that black mirror episode, also, watching it this time, yeah, yeah, just realizing, yeah, there are a lot of similarities there and how disturbing. But also you can see, like, the appeal of, like you know, it gets into questions of, like what even is a relationship and what is consciousness, and how do you know, you know, if you could never tell the difference that the person you were talking to was a robot or not. Does it matter? Like all those, like those questions that spawn off I love to think about and nerd out about.

Michael Tucker: 22:09

I have been playing around with AI and lots of different things that I've been working on. So, like, if I'm writing something or brainstorming something using these you know, the chat, gpt models and cloud and all these different things, mid journey, etc. Like I've, I'm someone who's sort of a techno optimist and always curious about the new thing and like how can you use it as a tool, and since so many of these new AI tools seemed geared toward creativity in a way, that's, I think, unexpected, I was very curious to play around with it, and so I have played around a lot with those things and I've had varying levels of success with it. And I'm happy that I have played around a lot with those things and I've had varying levels of success with it, and I'm happy that I've played around with it, because I think I'm not scared of it in a way that you know, people that don't understand, like, what's happening under the hood or haven't, like, really tested the limitations of them, I think there can be a fear around them, but occasionally I have used LLM AI models to spur creative ideas, not really to create them, but almost just like.

Michael Tucker: 23:22

In some ways I've thought about it as like when Alex and I my creative partner are brainstorming ideas. Sometimes you just need to say something out loud to someone and have them say something back at you and even if nothing they say actually moves on to the next round of brainstorming, just that interfacing and interaction can trigger new ideas for you, and so the most successful things I think I've had with ai are moments where it's kind of doing that a little bit. Um, so yeah, but I'm it's weird.

Michael Tucker: 23:58

The relationship that I have had with ai stuff has started with excitement and like what's this going to do? This is going to unlock everything, and then diving in more and realizing, well, there's still a lot of limitations and it can't really do all the things that we maybe thought it could do. And really the the harder work of being creative like you don't want to replace that, like that's, that's the part that the human needs to do to make something, and so it's kind of changed the way I look at them. Can we use them to get everything else out of the way so that I can do the hard part of being creative and being alone and brainstorming? Um, yeah, so that's my kind of general spiel about AI.

Taylor D. Adams: 24:45

Yeah, I think, um, I've been using it. Or just AI tools as more like. Yeah, like you said, like sounding boards, basically, like I have this thought, I don't know what it is. Throw it in some kind of AI model, see what spits back out, and I'll either go, oh, that's interesting or no, that's awful. I will not, I will then. Then it triggers another idea that ends up being even better. So I totally get that.

Taylor D. Adams: 25:09

So sorry for the interruption, but I will be brief. I am so grateful that you decided to listen to the Film Nuts podcast today. If you are enjoying what you're hearing, please consider supporting the show on Patreon. With a small monthly amount, you can get access to behind the scenes goodies, early access to full episodes and you can vote on what movie we watch the first Monday of every month on the Nuthouse Discord.

Taylor D. Adams: 25:29

The Nuthouse itself is free to join and is full of other film and TV lovers, so you'll fit right in. You can check out info on all these things in the show notes, and if all of this sounds like a bit too much, that's totally OK. But if you want to keep up to date on all our episodes, please be sure and subscribe on your favorite platform of choice and if you're listening on Apple podcast, go ahead and leave a rating review so we can get in front of other awesome people like yourself. Ok, enough of me rambling Back to the good stuff. So, with a lot of your creator work being about the written word, like the literal screenplay of this movie as well as many others, and even on your podcast, you have like a lesson that you have from each movie that you all watch. Is there something that you really appreciate about how ex machina is written?

Michael Tucker: 26:18

yeah, absolutely, I think it's. I love how efficient and simple the narrative is, the and I was mentioning you know earlier that some of that was found in the editing and so I talk about this in my video. But the opening scene of Ex Machina, you know we start on Caleb.

Michael Tucker: 26:41

He wins this prize, we know he's going somewhere within two minutes, we know the basic setup for everything and he's on the helicopter off to wherever he's going, and so I love how just efficient that inciting incident is, like it doesn't waste any time, it just gets us going so we know generally where we're going. But we have all these questions now set up that we want answered. This movie is really great about asking questions and implanting questions in the audience's mind, and then that helicopter scene in the script was a very long scene of like lots of exposition and the movie.

Michael Tucker: 27:16

They just keep two lines of dialogue yeah, I was gonna say that scene lasted five seconds, I thought right, yeah, and I think that's uh, yeah, that's one of the things that I appreciated when analyzing the video to when analyzing the movie to make the video was seeing those changes from script to screen, that the script already being efficient, but then also seeing those differences.

Michael Tucker: 27:44

Um, I think that's a good way to to learn is compare and contrast what the creator thought was going to work and then what actually ended up working, what was changed, and in that instance it was like a less is more, explaining too much about like I won this prize. I'm going to be staying here for a week. I don't know anything about this print. Like we don't need that laundry list of things like less is more. That creates questions in our in our head, um, um and yeah. So I just love. I love to study this movie for those reasons, and there's also a really cool edit change where there's a scene in the movie where caleb uh, where nathan shows caleb how he designed ava and sort of gives them like a quick tour of the lab here we have her mind Structured gel.

Clip: 28:40

I had to get away from circuitry. I needed something that could arrange and rearrange on a molecular level to keep its form when required. Holding for memories, shifting for thoughts this is her hardware wetware.

Michael Tucker: 28:57

That comes in a different place in the script. I think it comes a little bit earlier and as part of kind of the more of the onboarding part of the sequence right it's like welcome, caleb, here's what you're gonna be doing like an exposition dump pretty much yeah, yeah, and they moved it to be after one of the ava sessions in a way that I think is really smart because of you know the kind of with every ava session, caleb's getting more and more pulled into you know, his kind of uh, you know desire for her, you know swept obsession, whatever you want to call it, and so they put that scene after one of those, and so it creates this kind of juxtaposition where caleb is like getting swept up and they're like, oh my god, this is a person.

Michael Tucker: 29:50

And then juxtaposed with a like here's why she's not a person, here's her brain, here's the mechanical parts, and so I think it just adds a a nice contrast and dynamic to Caleb's arc, to kind of make it be a little bit more going back and forth between do I believe this is a person?

Taylor D. Adams: 30:08

No, no, it can't be a person, but maybe I do believe this is a person, and so I think having that dynamic keeps it interesting and prevents it from just being like a linear one, two, three, four, five kind of thing.

Taylor D. Adams: 30:22

Yeah, I think, now that you mentioned it, that switch of the explanation of like what ava's brain is I think also for the audience, it gets us invested as to why we should care about the science behind it, like we see Ava and get to know her as a character, and then that we have the explanation as to like why she's different, which I think is pretty cool, cause, yeah, like everyone's first instinct when they write a screenplay is like to go like linear. I remember in college video production class, like everybody had their own like assignment and we were did like storyboarding presentations Every single person's video storyboard. The first story shot of a storyboard was an alarm clock. Like there were 12 people it's amazing and every single person started with an alarm clock and after the fourth one I was like, oh, I think we're supposed to realize that we're doing this. Let's try to switch things up. So I think that's super just refreshing when things kind of like mix up the chronology without actually mixing up the timeline. I think it's pretty impossible. Yeah, yeah, a hundred percent.

Taylor D. Adams: 31:23

So this was Alex Garland's first movie that he both wrote and directed Um. Since then he's done four other projects, including a TV series, Looking back at Ex Machina.

Michael Tucker: 31:42

Can you possibly sense kind of the trajectory that he's gone on with his projects? I think it's one of those things where in the moment when it, when Ex Machina came out, it was like there's multiple paths forward that reality could take. And now I'm kind of using like devs language it's fitting.

Michael Tucker: 31:59

It's fitting for this conversation where it's like, oh, this is like a new director. This movie felt so intentional and like, well rendered and the storytelling is really great. Was this an accident or is this a new person that has this high level of mastery that's going to go on to make amazing things? And I feel like that's often the case when a new director makes a movie and it's really great. It's like, is this going to be a pattern or is this a one-off?

Michael Tucker: 32:29

And I think what's been interesting about Alex Garland's directorial career is that every topic that he's made a movie or series about I find really interesting and I'm always excited about seeing someone tackle things like determinism or you know, this kind of weird self-destructive, psychedelic tour of whatever you know annihilation was, so it's. It's been interesting seeing that trend continue of like these interesting kind of challenging, subversive topics and ideas being explored. In his work, the directing, a lot of the things that I really like about ex machina have persisted, like good cinematography, interesting camera choices. I feel like the the life and fun that was in ex machina has been absent for me and devs in annihilation anyway, and I actually haven't seen uh men or civil war so, and I think that kind of says they're not fun, I mean there's no level of fun.

Taylor D. Adams: 33:49

I mean, I haven't seen civil war yet, but yeah, there's no level of fun in men. I'll tell you that, yeah, so yeah, there's no level of fun in men.

Michael Tucker: 33:54

I'll tell you that yeah, so yeah it's. I think it's interesting to then go back and see the seeds of what would continue like are there in Ex Machina.

Taylor D. Adams: 34:11

But I think that a lot of the things that make this movie special and stand out to me, were not brought along to some of some of his other work. So yeah, alex Carlin recently said that he's going to kind of take a break from directing for a while for civil work kind of focus a little bit more on writing. I mean, we can speculate all kinds of reasons, but do you, what do you think about artists kind of voluntarily scaling back responsibility in order to kind of like maybe focus on one particular part of the craft?

Michael Tucker: 34:38

I think in general I support that, or at least support the self-reflection that that seems to be evidence of.

Michael Tucker: 34:48

It's really interesting because I remember listening to interviews with him when ex machina came out and people were sort of saying like, wow, this is your first time directing.

Michael Tucker: 35:00

This is amazing, all this stuff. And the vibe and his responses that I got was essentially like yeah, directing is not that hard. Like we put too much emphasis on directing, like writing is the more challenging thing. Like we put too much emphasis on directing, like writing is the more challenging thing. And so it's interesting to hear him start from that place of like yeah, directing isn't a big deal, to now saying I'm gonna step back from directing a little bit and so we can only you know, guess as to what that journey was, but I think it's maybe. I'd be curious to hear him talk further about that and how he has felt about directing now that he's done it a bunch of times. Like how has that changed his perception of what directing entails and how that might also change how he writes things in the future. Like I think that's to see a creator go on that arc. I think means that there's something interesting to mine from their experience, and I wish I could do that because I'm very curious.

Taylor D. Adams: 36:00

I'm actually. I find it kind of similar to what you were talking about earlier, where you, earlier on your career, you're making a bunch of stuff and the feedback you were getting was on the writing. And so then it finally clicked to. You're like, oh, I will now focus on the writing. And so then, if I like click to you, you're like, oh, I will now focus on the writing. So I wonder if it's something like that where there's something within his career or even feedback he's getting and that's like hey, like maybe we need to work on this thing over here and then we can come back to this thing over here. So it could be something like that Maybe.

Michael Tucker: 36:27

Yeah, maybe I feel like like directing is so hard and you have to wear a lot of hats and bring a lot of skills to the table, and I've been noticing there's, I think, more like directing duos that have been coming out over the past, you know, 10, 15 years, and I'm curious if that trend will continue, cause I think in some ways it's a disservice to film to expect a single person to be great at all of the things that are required for directing, and so I think someone like Alex Garland there's clearly a lot of things that he's really really great at what, if you paired that with the right person?

Michael Tucker: 37:10

Is that kind of alchemy that, back and forth, does that solve problems or unlock new things? And I feel that way about a lot of directors like now that I wish I could. You know you're really good at this thing and I think you're a little too set in your ways on that. So I want you to just pair up with someone that's going to shake you loose a little bit, cause I think that spontaneity might I don't bring some creativity and excitement back to it was there a similar kind of alchemy, as you said, when you and alex skyers started working together?

Michael Tucker: 37:42

yeah, I think so it this is also.

Michael Tucker: 37:45

This is one of the reasons why I think about it a lot is because I've personally gone on this journey of being like a solo.

Michael Tucker: 37:50

I am an auteur, I'm going to make a michael tucker film to really enjoying directing as a collaboration with alex, but I also understand how difficult it is because we had to go on that journey and even as, like close friends, there's a lot of competition, there's insecurity, there's a you, a desire to preserve the thing that you love, and so you can be really defensive about a style or a camera shot, a period in your script, like whatever it is like.

Michael Tucker: 38:24

There there's an opportunity for a lot of conflict and it takes a lot of vulnerability and trust to truly collaborate with someone. But having gotten to the other side of that, I am seeing all the great things that come with it, and so I'm hoping that that's a thing that more people do and and a journey that more people go on, because I feel like that collaboration and communication is what helps you make something you couldn't make by yourself, that neither person could. It's something new that is being spawned into the universe that doesn't that can still feel like it comes from an author, but it doesn't have to be a person, if that makes sense yeah, that totally makes sense.

Taylor D. Adams: 39:06

I mean, that's one of the reasons why I love, you know, filmmaking in general too, is just that collaboration, like I feel like working in an artistic space as like one individual solo, like it's just not as rewarding, you know, yeah, um, so I'm gonna quote one of your, one of your, uh, one of your videos here uh, talking about ex machina. So ex machina treats the audience like intelligent human beings, encouraging us to participate in the story instead of turning our brains off. I believe this is what every film should strive for With that statement. Do you think that that is why you have such a passion for video games?

Michael Tucker: 39:47

Yes, Hmm, that's interesting. I kind of thought about that angle of it, but I think, yeah, there's probably something there. I think there's one of the things that's so fun about video games is that it's explicitly participatory an avatar in this world on this journey, and you are going through the motions, you are doing the thing, and I think great movies can elicit a similar psychology and headspace of like I'm wrapped up in this and I'm I might not be consciously thinking, but my brain is definitely taking in what I'm seeing and I'm trying to figure out how I feel about this person or this action. What do I want to happen? What am I afraid is going to happen? Like that, the kind of reality melts away and you're just lost in this. You know space, where you are. Yeah, I don't even know how to describe it, but but whatever that is, I feel like video games kind of tap directly into that and can use that to really great effect, and so, yeah, I think there's there's something there.

Taylor D. Adams: 41:02

Yeah, I was like I was rewatching all these, just all this material and I was like that actually kind of makes sense, like knowing that you're currently working at Bioware, working on video games, like I can see the connection beyond storytelling entertainment, like there's, there seems to be more of a connection there along like the, like you said, participatory route. This question is a little out there, but how would you turn Ex Machina into a video game?

Michael Tucker: 41:28

that's a really good challenge and question. And so I was trying to think about this and the where my brain went was there's this video game called her story. I don't know if you've heard of that, but it's. It's basically a. It's like a collection of interviews with a woman and they're like video recorded, like so it's actual videos and you're. It's essentially like you're role-playing like a police detective and you have to try to figure out did she commit this crime or not, just by watching these kind of police interviews with her on different days, and so you can try to track like oh, oh, when did she say this thing? But then she changed her story over there and sort of. You're kind of doing that, that detective work.

Michael Tucker: 42:19

And there's lots of games that are that kind of put you in that mindset. And I also really like rogue, like games where every time you play it it's a little bit different. Hades I was obsessed with, where it's telling a story a little bit different. Hades, I was obsessed with, where it's telling a story. But you know the the gameplay is kind of similar that you always start in one place and you progress through the levels one by one, by one, and you get to the end, and then you either die along the way and go back to the start, or you get to the end and then go back to the start. But every time you play it's a little bit different. The enemies are you, the enemy palette changes, the maps change, and Hades is great at telling a story also while doing that, and so you're learning little bits about the characters and the relationship in the world while that's happening.

Michael Tucker: 43:05

And so, with all of that in my head, I was thinking about what I love about Ex Machina is this puzzle of who do you trust? So you're caleb and you're going into the space. Do I trust nathan? Do I trust ava? Who's this robot? Do I trust kyoko? What is kyoko? Is she in person? Is she robot?

Michael Tucker: 43:24

Like all those questions, and so some kind of like simulator roguelike where you're dropped into the scenario and maybe you're even a different player on the board. So like maybe sometimes you are the nathan character and your goal is to manipulate caleb and ava and kyoko in order to, you know, motivate ava, escape, and that's like your goal. But every time you play, the Caleb character is a different personality and has different wants or different needs, and similarly, if you play as Caleb Nathan's, different this time, interesting All those different players on the board playing through this game with a little bit of randomization each time, and your job is to somehow manipulate everybody to get what you want, never quite sure who is what, or you know that's. That's what I love about this movie is that dynamic, and I think trying to recreate that feeling in a video game would be really fun and challenging.

Taylor D. Adams: 44:35

Yeah, that sounds intense. I've only played a couple roguelike games and I don't like them, but I might try that because that sounds super interesting, especially the game you mentioned, her Story. I might check that out. That sounds awesome. Just because I love detective stuff, I think that's a lot of fun like puzzle solving. So as many times as you watch this movie, do you have a favorite moment or scene from Ex Machina?

Michael Tucker: 45:01

In some ways it's hard to choose, but in other ways it's really easy. I love the dancing scene.

Clip: 45:06

However, you would not be wasting your time if you were dancing with her. If you were dancing with her.

Taylor D. Adams: 45:18

I remember like that moment. Do you know how to do it? Have you watched it enough that you can?

Michael Tucker: 45:21

recreate it? I don't think so.

Michael Tucker: 45:24

There's like a cool, like elbow move that they do at the end that's kind of fun, oh yeah, but I remember being in the theater and that kind of being the moment where I was like, oh, this seals the deal, like this movie has, has all these other like cerebral and tension and that kind of sinister vibe that you were talking about, but also has space for a disco dance scene. That makes sense and it's revealing character about like Nathan and all the stuff, but it's also just silly and fun and making me like laugh. Uh. So I really love that scene and I feel like it's another call out of like there's no scene in annihilation that makes me laugh.

Taylor D. Adams: 46:04

like I don't know that there's that many scenes where people smile in annihilation I would be very worried if there was something about annihilation that made you go like smile super wide Right.

Michael Tucker: 46:14

There's lots of things I love about annihilation and devs et cetera, but it's that there's something about Ex Machina that makes it the whole package. For me that was missing from some of those other movies.

Taylor D. Adams: 46:26

Michael. Thanks so much, man. This has been a lot of fun to talk about this movie with you. I really appreciate your time. I really appreciate the podcast you put out and I can't wait to play whatever you're working on next.

Michael Tucker: 46:39

I'm excited about that too, and yeah, thank you for having me on. This was fun. I'm glad I got to revisit this movie. I'm glad I still love it and, yeah, it was a lot of fun chatting about it with you.

Taylor D. Adams: 46:52

I love the idea of media being more than just entertaining. Sure, entertainment is important, and sometimes I do want to shut my brain off at the end of the day for an hour or two. But when a movie or a TV show or even a piece of music asks us, as the audience, to think about and question what it has to say, it's a richer and fuller experience. My job here on the Film Notes podcast is to ask questions and hopefully those questions lead to an entertaining discussion for you to listen to. But more than that, my goal is to get you to get to know and connect with my guests through a shared appreciation of what they love. It's my own attempt at capturing that entertainment and appreciation balance that Michael is such a proponent of, Because when we truly listen and think about what we each have to say, we create a deeper connection to one another. A massive amount of thanks to Michael for chatting with me today and a thank you the size of Nathan's estate to you for chatting with me today and a thank you the size of Nathan's estate to you for joining me. If you want to take a look at some of the podcasts and video essays Michael has done with him and his team. Please check out the links in the show notes as well, and also I have a downloadable copy of the ex Machina script for free. Check it out If you want to take a look at what Michael has been talking about in his video essays and on this podcast.

Taylor D. Adams: 48:14

If you enjoyed the show today, please, pretty, pretty please go ahead and subscribe on your favorite podcast platform of choice. And if you happen to be listening on Apple podcasts, please leave a rating review. That helps us get in front of more awesome, awesome people like yourself. If you're really enjoying the show and you want to help us grow and get bigger and you know, shoot in cool places or whatever please consider becoming a patron of the show. You can find some information about that in the show notes as well, or you can visit patreoncom slash film nuts. There's some cool perks there. Check it out.

Taylor D. Adams: 48:48

Our theme this season is brought to us by the deep end. Our artwork is designed by Modongo Sipikudi, and all episodes of the Film Nuts podcast are produced and edited by me, Taylor D Adams. If you want to get in touch, you can email filmnutspodcast at gmailcom or follow us on TikTok and Instagram at filmnutspodcast, and don't forget to join the Nuthouse Discord community absolutely free by checking out the link in the show notes as well. It's a lot of fun. We chat like every day and then every Monday we all watch a movie together. It's a blast. You check it out. But thank you again so much for joining us today and until next time.