Kubrick, A.I., and the Problem of Pinocchio: Reassessing the Evidence of A.I.: Artificial Intelligence

Abstract

Utilizing the extensive materials available at the Stanley Kubrick Archive, this paper presents a re-evaluation of Kubrick's part in the creation of Spielberg's 2001 film, A.I. Artificial Intelligence. I begin by going over the manner in which the film's contemporary reviewers produced the sense of a film full of tension and unresolvable contradiction, something largely attributed to the radically distinct styles and world-views of Spielberg and his mentor, Kubrick. The paper then goes on to read Kubrick's work (mainly on treatments of the developing story) with the last two writers he worked with on the project. This return to the narrative work Kubrick and his writers expended on the story, demonstrates that far from being the project of irreconcilable differences between the two writers, Kubrick always faced and never successfully resolved a tension within his story between science and myth, between a narrative of scientific orientation (humanity evolving into machines) and a narrative of fantasy and myth (a machine-boy who becomes human).