Biblical Intertextuality (Part 8): Jonah and A.I.

The final movie I want to discuss is the science-fiction film A.I.  It is unique in that although it contains much of the same imagery and symbolism found in Pinocchio and the story of Jonah, and although the ultimate theme deals with the hope of re-creation and resurrection, A.I. in fact denies this hope. It ends up being a perfect example of a post-modern culture that attempts to retain a positive and optimistic hope concerning meaning in life, while denying the very thing that gives life hope and meaning. Consequently, the final thirty minutes of the movie that deal with, and ultimately reject, the very concept of re-creation and resurrection end up being the downfall of the movie. The reason why the ending does not work is because it attempts to be optimistic about life while it is at the same time denying any hope about resurrection.

A.I. is purposely patterned after the Pinocchio story, and therefore contains much of the same connections with Jonah as Pinocchio. The setting is in the late 21^st century. The polar ice caps have melted, the climates have become “chaotic,” and the world’s coastlands have been submerged under water. Thus we learn that the one city mentioned in the movie, New York, is underwater, with only the tops of the skyscrapers still above water. This will have significance later on.

Mechas, David, and the Failed Human Experiment
In the opening scene of the movie, we find an inventor, Professor Hobby, discussing with his colleagues his proposal to attempt to create a boy “mecha” who is able to love. Since the cosmic upheaval, human beings had to monitor their numbers, so that they would not grow so numerous as to deplete the remaining natural resources. Yet because of human beings’ advanced scientific knowledge, they were to create adult mechas—robots that looked, acted, and reasoned like human beings. They were used as house-keepers, nannies, doctors, prostitutes, as well as other positions, in order to serve human beings. Once created, they did not eat or consume any resources.

Professor Hobby, though, for reasons that will become apparent later, wanted to create a child mecha who would have the ability to love. His stated reason for this proposal was that these child mechas would be available to couples who were not able to have children. Throughout the rest of the movie, we see the tragic inhumane response human beings have to these machines they have created.

A couple who works for the company that produces these mechas volunteer to take the first one made because their own son is in a seemingly irreversible coma. The name of the boy mecca is David. Once programmed, he loves his mother unconditionally. Eventually though, the couple’s son comes out of the coma, and the couple eventually reject David and abandon him. While living with the family though, David was told the story of Pinocchio; so when he is abandoned, he believes that if he can find the Blue Fairy, that she will turn him into a real boy, and then his mother would love him and accept him. The rest of the movie is about David’s search for the Blue Fairy.

The story of A.I. is patterned after the story of Pinocchio, but contains some vital differences. Geppetto loved Pinocchio, and went out to search for him when Pinocchio was led astray. David though is abandoned by his human family, and he ends up being hunted and chased by human beings who want to destroy mechas. At every turn, though he is programmed to love, he is ironically treated inhumanely by humans. Also, within the fairytale of Pinocchio, the Blue Fairy is a real person, whereas within the world of A.I., the story of Pinocchio, and thus the Blue Fairy, is understood to be a fairytale, and not real at all. The tragedy is that David does not realize this.

His search for the Blue Fairy is doomed from the start, for there is no Blue Fairy.

David’s Search for His Maker
In any case, with the help of a gigolo mecha named Joe, David eventually finds his way to where he believes the Blue Fairy lives—New York City, now submerged by the waters of the ocean, and known to the mechas as “the lost city of the sea at the end of the world.” In a skyscraper still above water, David finds the company that produces mechas, and meets the man who designed him—his maker and “father.” Yet tragically David finds out he is not special and unique at all. When he meets Professor Hobby, the professor explains to him that he was their “great experiment,” and though they had lost track of him when his “parents” abandoned him, they hoped he would be able to develop the ability to hope and dream, and eventually find his way back to New York City.

Once David was abandoned, Professor Hobby put out a “clue” in the information banks of “Dr. Know” (an interactive question-answer data base where people can pay a certain amount of money, ask any question about anything, and find information on that topic) that the Blue Fairy lived in the lost city of the sea. Since Professor Hobby found out David had heard the story of Pinocchio, his hope was that David would believe in the fairy tale so much that he would hope that it was true, and would go looking for the Blue Fairy, so he could become a real boy. The professor tells David the “experiment” was whether David, being a mecha, would logically reason that, “the Blue Fairy is part of the great human flaw—to wish for things that don’t exist;” or whether his love for his mother would create in him the human hope and desire to override the logical conclusion, and actually go searching for the Blue Fairy.

According to Professor Hobby, this “greatest human flaw” is also an exceptional gift that allows humans to dream. After he is told this, David says, “I thought I was one of a kind,” to which Professor Hobby replies, “My son was one of a kind; you are the first of a kind.” It is then when we realize that Professor Hobby had made David to look like his own son who was no longer alive.

When Professor Hobby goes off to gather his colleagues, David enters another room, and finds the entire room contains an assembly line of partially made mechas that look exactly like him. He realizes, although he has always been told he is unique and special, that he is, in fact, not unique at all. Each real human being is unique; but he, being a mecha, is simply one copy of an entire assembly line of meccas. His belief in his individuality and uniqueness is shattered.

Jonah Connections
At this point connections with Jonah can be seen. David, upon seeing that he is not unique, jumps into the sea, and ends up being carried by a school of fish (though not a great fish) to Coney Island, where he sees a glimpse of what he believes is the Blue Fairy. As they carry him to what we later learn is the Pinocchio ride at Coney Island, we see in the background the giant “great fish” model that is one of the props to the ride. The allusion is clear: this is a re-telling of Pinocchio, which in turn carries with it the basic re-creation/death and resurrection theme of the Jonah-inspired passages of the gospels. What David thinks is the Blue Fairy is really only the statue of the Blue Fairy at the Pinocchio ride at Coney Island. Yet David, completely enraptured by the sight of what he believes is the Blue Fairy, simply stays underwater, forever praying to the Blue Fairy.

Two thousand years go by, the human race is now extinct, and the world is in the midst of an ice age. The only things that survive are an advanced form of the mechas, and they are conducting “excavations” on a now frozen over New York City. They find a frozen David, but since he is not human, he is still alive. When they wake him up, he walks up to the frozen statue of the Blue Fairy, touches it, and it breaks apart before his eyes. The advanced mechas explain to him that the entire human race is extinct, and that he is the only one in the world who has had firsthand contact with the now extinct human race. They can learn much about the human race by using his mind as a “database” and reading his memories.

When he asks if his “mother” is still alive, they tell him that she has long since died, but they can resurrect her from his memories, and he can see her again. The only thing though, is that anyone they resurrect can only survive for one day. At the end of that day, they go to sleep, never to awake again, and never being able to be resurrected again. David, since he has been programmed to love, still wants to see her again. So the advanced meccas resurrect her, and David and his mother spend one beautiful day together. At the end of the day, when she goes to sleep, we are told that David does something he has never been able to do before—he falls asleep. The two never wake up again. That is the end of the movie.

Conclusion
What makes this movie so tragic is the complete denial and rejection of human dignity, resurrection, and hope for a re-creation. Although it uses much of the same imagery and symbolism seen in Jonah, expounded in the New Testament, and interpreted by Pinnochio, A.I. ultimately rejects the hope of resurrection and re-creation. What A.I. teaches is that human beings are not made in the image of God, for there is no God. In fact, human beings are more inhumane than the machines they make. Furthermore, David learns that his individuality and uniqueness is an illusion: David can never become a real boy, for that is impossible. The Blue Fairy, the hope of resurrection and the longing for re-creation, is a fairytale. Besides, what good would it do if David became a real boy? Human beings were now extinct, with no hope of any sort of lasting resurrected life.

Somehow, the movie tries to put a good spin on all of this. The fact that David, who is programmed to love (and thus must—is that really love?), is able to spend one happy day with the woman who abandoned him, only to have both of them sleep into oblivion at the end of the movie, is somehow supposed to leave the movie-goer feeling optimistic about life. David never becomes a real boy, and human life is extinct. A.I. tries to give purpose and meaning to life while it at the same time denies resurrection.

Pinocchio incorporated a simplified version of the death and resurrection, and “re-creation” themes, and showed that a wooden puppet was re-created into a real boy after his ordeal within the sea monster. Finally, A. I. is an example of a film that purposely re-tells the story of Pinocchio, yet ultimately denies the hope of resurrection and re-creation. All four works are modern examples of intertextuality with the story of Jonah; yet as is quite evident, all four works choose to reinterpret the story of Jonah in very different ways.