Essays Last All Year Long

Below is a draft of a paper I wrote for Film and Literature last year. Although it's a work of comparison, several of its themes pertain to digital culture, including VR, cyborg relations, posthumanity, and remix culture. Are there sections of this draft we could use to spawn creative thinking or supplement future work?

You'll need to have watched A.I. or read “Supertoys Last All Summer Long” to understand all the references. You could also brush up with an online summary.

You may notice an absence of citations in the paper; I hadn't added them by the time I wrote this draft.


“Supertoys” and Artificial Intelligence Brandon Healy
The relationship between Brian Aldiss’s short story “Supertoys Last All Summer Long” and Steven Spielberg’s rather lengthy film Artificial Intelligence is somewhat superficial. While both works stand alone as entertaining and engaging pieces that succeed in their respective explorations of some of the more dramatic relationships between robots, humanity, love, and reality, Spielberg’s film departs from Aldiss’s short story by adding heavily to the plot. Among Spielberg's extensive additions are characters, concepts, and locations. Some of these additions work better than others and many are tangential. However, it is through these additions that Spielberg is also able to capture some of the key messages the short story hints at but does not fully develop. An interesting example of the interrelationship between the film and text is found in both interpretations’ treatment of the “sibling” scene, in which Monica and Henry rejoice at the prospect of producing a sibling for David. Specifically, Aldiss’s dialogue, Spielberg’s inclusion of an actual sibling for David, and both interpretations’ focus on breaking silence with raucous, emotional outbursts strongly interrelate.

In the section of the text where Monica and her husband Henry find out they can have a child, Aldiss’s dialogue is much more extensive than Spielberg's, and in some ways the film is lacking. In Spielberg’s version, Monica gets a phone call and the typical “no way” and “you’ve got to be joking”-type dialogue that often accompanies surprising news in film ensues. In many ways, this is a good interpretation because Spielberg leaves out specific details and stimulates the audience with a short period of suspense. Many people, including Linda Seger, the author of The Art of Adaptation: Turning Fact and Fiction into Film, would probably agree that this is an effective adaptation to the medium of film. It evokes emotion and engages the audience.

However, the scene immediately following shows Monica running in slow motion toward Henry. Happy music drowns out the dialogue between Monica and her husband while they embrace and jump up and down. David is in the room and looks on with hesitation. While Aldiss’s dialogue appropriately matches its medium in this scene, the Spielberg version missed out on an opportunity to provide some insight into the couple’s feelings about David comparative to their feelings about their own potential child. The following dialogue from Aldiss’s text demonstrates this contrast:

. . . “Henry, Henry – oh, my darling, I was in despair … but I’ve just dialed the afternoon post and – you’ll never believe it! Oh, it’s wonderful!” . . .
“What do we do about them?” Henry asked [looking out the window].
“Teddy’s no trouble. He works well.”
“Is David malfunctioning?”
“His verbal communication-center is still giving trouble. I think he’ll have to go back to the factory again.”
“Okay. We’ll see how he does before the baby’s born.”

Here, Aldiss points out that Monica despairs even with David in her life. This means that David failed to fulfill his sole responsibility to comfort her. Monica then compares David to Teddy, the other machine, and talks strictly about David’s mechanical components. Henry dismissively changes the subject. In this scene, it seems as if Aldiss is emphasizing the human ability to outgrow and detach from things. Monica quickly becomes pragmatic in the face of opportunity and forgets her emotional attachment to David witnessed earlier in the story. Her knowledge that David is a machine also causes her to overlook the possibility that he feels complex emotions that typical kids have trouble expressing. This causes her to dismiss his unfinished messages as problems with his verbal communication-center.

Meanwhile, the expendable machines down in the garden heatedly struggle to determine their place and the meaning of existence. The audience is able to connect with their struggle to find meaning and sympathize with their naivety in the face of potential abandonment.

Although Spielberg may have missed the mark by discarding Aldiss’s dialogue, he makes an effective addition to the “sibling” section of the text by altering the good news Henry and Monica receive and adding a brother character named Martin. Spielberg’s addition of Martin effectively embodies the contrast between David and a real boy. It also highlights Aldiss’s idea that David is actually real in quite a few ways. Through David’s interaction with Martin, Spielberg demonstrates that David has the ability to calculate, ponder, set goals, grapple with feelings, and pursue aspirations. As the plot thickens, Spielberg shows David becoming even more human. Spielberg’s illustration plays with the idea that an object can become human simply by taking on human characteristics. Is David human? What does it mean to be human if he isn’t? Does he have a soul? In both Spielberg and Aldiss’s stories, Monica is attached to David emotionally at differing levels but never treats him like she would treat a real boy—like she would treat Martin. However, the audience in both interpretations is made to believe that David is functionally identical to a real boy, cognitively and emotionally. This is a side of David that Monica never sees, or at least never acknowledges.

Both interpretations leave the audience pondering what it means to be human, but Spielberg’s interpretation embodies the contrast more effectively by placing David and Martin in situations in which they closely interact. A good example of this occurs at the dinner table when both boys engage in a spinach-eating competition as Monica protests.

Spielberg’s interpretation also places more of an emphasis on the animal question by frequently placing David in the same room as Martin and Teddy. In these scenes, the audience sees that David shares far more cognitive and emotional similarities with Martin than Teddy, particularly as he reasons through the problem of making Monica love him. On another level, however, Teddy’s presence evokes the idea of an animal and reminds us that David has a higher cognitive function than animals. If David functions at a higher cognitive level than animals, does that make him real? If not, is being organic the only requirement? Ultimately, Martin’s addition incorporates several new layers of depth and contrast to the story.

Although Aldiss’s dialogue is more effective than Spielberg’s and Spielberg’s additions develop Aldiss’s concepts more fully in the “sibling” scene, the two interpretations are similar in terms of tone. Primarily, both interpretations create silence to break it later on. Also in both cases, the silence is broken by emotional outbursts from Monica and Henry.

In Aldiss’s version, the tone of the Swinton’s home is depressing before Henry comes home. Monica’s interactions with David lead only to frustration and tears. With Henry’s arrival, Aldiss’s vocabulary becomes loud and forceful. He uses phrases such as “immediately . . . flung her arms round him,” “kiss[ed] him ardently,” “clasped her tighter,” “yell[ed in] joy,” and “laugh[ed] at each other’s happiness.” The abrupt jarring leaves the audience wondering whether Monica cares about David at all. In Spielberg’s version, there is an awkward interchange between Monica and David before she answers the phone. The tone is almost eerie. The music quickly elevates as Monica discovers her biological son has been cured. David is left with an expression that mimics the previous tone, as if he is being left behind, while Monica and Henry advance with explosive new cadences.

Aldiss and Spielberg effectively contribute to each other’s interpretations of the “sibling” scene in terms of dialogue, adaptive licenses, and tone. Both artists largely remain true to their respective mediums while enacting these interpretations. Potential improvements can be found in both cases, but the armature and main plot points of the adaptation of this particular section remain intact.

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