Posted by AFRAID; 2024; Written & Directed by Chris Weitz; Starring John Cho, Katherine Waterson, David Dastmalchian; PG-13, 84m; Columbia Pictures
The terrible possibilities of Artificial Intelligence misuse are all over the public consciousness as of late. Mostly, this is in AI “art” and students attempting to use ChatGPT or other programs as their own work (poorly, I might add). My wife is an English teacher, and I have certifications for the same, even if I’m a substitute currently, so we can attest. But the looming threat of bigger problems is not far from our minds.
However, it’s not a new concept for fiction: AIs running houses or governments, running lives, destroying lives, become monstrous creatures, directly and in metaphor. While it’s not an evil AI, Ray Bradbury’s “There Will Come Soft Rains” presents an unsettling smart house as far back as 1950 (It’s one of my favorite short stories. I’d be remiss not mentioning it.). Of course, I can’t forget 2001: A Space Odyssey’s HAL 9000, all the weird of Dean Koontz’s Demon Seed and its movie, Skynet of The Terminator, or more modern takes such as last year’s critical and commercial hit M3GAN. Hell, The Simpsons‘s “Treehouse of Horror XII: Ultrahouse 3000” parodied the concept in 2001, using Pierse Brosnan’s AI to try to win Marge and kill Homer. (For Disney kids, there was 1999’s Smart House, but I’ve not seen it so I can’t compare)
Stick to The Simpsons. It’s infinitely better, and an hour and fourteen minutes shorter. Afraid (aka AfrAId, but I’m not writing that each time, my brain will break) is by far the least of all these takes.
The Chris Weitz-directed killer AI film Afraid is altogether awkward. The story of a family, led by John Cho and Katherine Waterson, who take in an experimental AI that soon takes over their lives for a little better and much more worse, is a mess of half-thought ideas, terrible scripting, and confusing choices.
Strange to have a cautionary tale about how awful AI can be (peppered with some of the good uses, so it’s not one hundred percent “Ugh AI is the woooo-oorrrrst”) seemingly written by AI. I half-heartedly apologize to Tarot for accusing it of feeling like it was written by a program. This is worse.
Weitz is the credited writer, but nothing about it feels human-generated. The dialogue is awkwardly phrased, if not on the nose. The characters are paper-thin and inconsistent in their actions. Every story beat feels half thought out, with several strange takes that don’t go anywhere, and often come out of nowhere.
Afraid feels like it was lens years ago, but it was immediately realized the film didn’t work. So it had reshoots, multiple edits, and other attempts to get it right. Then M3GAN hit and Weisz had to frantically alter things. Then he kept trying until an executive at Columbia said “Enough money has been spent, it’s done, just push it out as is”. So we’re left with an uncompleted film that doesn’t work and shows major editing has been done, leaving the audience with a multitude of loose ends of ideas, hinting at longer threads left in the editing bay.
Need proof of the lost story threads? Watch the trailer after watching the movie (or don’t, just trust me on this). Most of the hooks there? They’re gone, proving whole arcs, concepts, and character choices were excised. There are good ideas in the movie, but are lost in the static.
At one point this film was called They Listen and had a posted 1 hour 43 minute run time. Afraid is one hour twenty-four minutes including 5 minutes of credits. The missing 20 minutes (plus? Hard to gauge what might have been awkwardly removed before that number) is obvious. Dialogue lines reference conversations and actions we don’t see. Characters make split-second decisions out of nowhere. It’s unsure how long this takes place. The way it flows on release comes off as 3 days, but it also seems to be at least two weeks.
I’m also convinced the whole character of Iris, the eldest of the three children, was added in reshoots. She barely interacts with the rest of the family, and her end of things is very isolated from anything else happening in the film (and comes off strange, doesn’t have a single friend?). Adding and subtracting characters to a film as it’s being molded isn’t new but the way Iris is used highlights the awkwardness of the movie. I will say how she works with AIA is the freshest part of the story, the overall action isn’t new to teen films but the use of AI is prescient. It could be a movie on its own. But shoved in here, it’s a shame.
Worst of all, the big sin for films, is Afraid is simply boring. There is some entertainment to be mined in the “wait, what just happened?” aspects, as heard from myself and the audience members who didn’t give up and leave. There were many people jumping ship long before the credits rolled. The capable actors are trying their best. Let me note here: John Cho is a fantastic actor. An amazing performer who has not been given his due – go see Columbus, Searching, and Exorcist Season 2 and watch him shine. Katherine Waterston is given the one character note of “you’re upset at being a stay-at-home mom” (leading to some of those awkward phasings as they shoehorn it in). David Dastmalchian tries to give quirk to his tech bro. They all are fighting uphill against nothing. This is a horror movie where the scare sequences never land, leading to confused laughs instead of frights. The handful of jumpscares fail to land at all.
Afraid trods ground well-walked in sci-fi/horror, but brings nothing new to the table. Instead, it serves half-chewed appetizers from other restaurants. The plot is a mess, the characters are nothing, and the scares are non-existent.
Unplug this AI.
D
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