M3GAN

Today I satisfied one of my pleasures - watching horror movies - and viewed M3GAN (obviously pronounced Megan) which opened late last week. I'd categorise the movie as science-fiction horror with a lot of camp and comedy (mostly intentional, but some unintentional), and social commentary thrown in.

I'll try to keep spoiler alerts to a minimum here, but be warned if you want to actually see the movie. (Though to be fair, watching the trailer gives a fair hint of the likely plot of the movie!)

M3GAN - Official Trailer

The movie revolves around a toy company that has a line of products - PurrPetual Petz - which are animatronic companions for kids, with the especially compelling tagline that they're better than real pets because “they'll live longer than you'.

One of the main characters is a woman, Gemma, who is a brilliant designer/developer/product engineer at the company who has secretly been developing an AI-based robot designed to act as a companion for children. M3GAN is the Model 3 Generative ANdroid.

The other main character (apart from Megan herself - should I be giving an Android a gender?) is Cady, Gemma's niece who's recently lost her parents in a car accident, forcing Gemma to become her guardian.

Gemma, devoid of any parenting skills, decides that Megan would make an ideal playmate for Cady. They bond, and as expected, protection of Cady by Megan goes well beyond what might be deemed normal and appropriate.

Megan is played by a young Kiwi - Amie Donald - who did an amazing job with the part, doing great robotic movements when required, and doing some credible dance moves too in a very memorable scene.

The movie is rich in social commentary. Should we be using technology to raise our kids? How is AI going to affect our lives? One funny point was when Cady asks to be read a bed-time story by Gemma who says she can do it on her phone - oh wait, the app needs updating.

As a software developer (though not involved with AI in any way) I found it unintentionally funny in parts where the scriptwriters obviously had no clue about how software, or product development works.

Anyway, I very much enjoyed the movie, which was partially filmed in New Zealand. If it's your cup of tea, it's a fun watch!