- Director: Chris Weitz
- Screenplay: Chris Weitz
- Cast: John Cho, Katherine Waterston, Havana Rose Liu, David Dastmalchian, Keith Carradine
- Cinematography: Javier Aguirresarobe
- Editing: Priscilla Nedd-Friendly, Tim Alverson
- Score: Alex Weston
- Genre: Science fiction horror
- Runtime: 84 minutes
Horror movie concepts have shifted through the decades; we’ve had the slashers of the 70s/80s, the ‘Scream‘ series in the 90s with its meta approach to storytelling, and the found footage fad of the 2010s. AI-related thrillers seem to be this decade’s cinematic thing – with 2022’s pop culture phenomenon ‘M3GAN‘ and ‘T.I.M.‘ (2023) really launching the craze.
In ‘Afraid‘ (the movie posters emphasising the ‘AI’ in the title), Curtis (John Cho), his wife Meredith (Katherine Waterston) and their three kids are selected to test a new cutting edge artificial intelligence device called ‘AIA’, installed in their home and listening to their every movement. With such technological capabilities, AIA assumes the minutiae of the family’s lives; dealing with finances, reading bedtime stories and even diagnosing medical conditions overlooked by doctors. AIA is too good to be true, obviously.
This feels like a ‘technology = evil’ parable – that’s not necessarily a bad thing at all but it’s a little too overt at times. It gets off to a promising start which surprised me; I thought this was going to be low-budget trash with absolute nobodies cast as the parents. It shines a light on how reliant we are on these gadgets and the dominance they have over us and also explores the very serious repercussions this tech has on young folk – including the social media trend of ‘swatting’ (calling the police pretending to be held hostage and giving them someone else’s address as a ‘practical joke’) and the horrors of having your face used against your will in deepfake pornography.
The story malfunctions in the third act with nonsense about AI turning people into unruly killers. Disappointing – ChatGPT could write a better ending to be honest. Not that I will trust artificial intelligence again after watching this. Time to throw my Alexa in the bin.
My rating: 6 / 10
SilverScreen 