The Creator (2023 film)

The Creator (2023 film)
The Creator is a 2023 American epic science fiction action thriller film produced and directed by Gareth Edwards, who co-wrote the screenplay with Chris Weitz. The film stars John David Washington, Gemma Chan, Ken Watanabe, Sturgill Simpson and Allison Janney. Set in 2070, 15 years after a nuclear detonation in Los Angeles and a war against artificial intelligence, an ex-special forces agent is recruited to hunt down and kill the "Creator," who has developed a mysterious weapon with the power to end the war.
Development began in November 2019 when Edwards signed on to direct and write an untitled science fiction project for New Regency and was officially announced in February 2020. Washington was hired in May 2021, and the rest of the cast joined over the next year. Filming began in January 2022 in Thailand with an $80 million production budget, and wrapped that May.
The Creator was released in the United States on September 29, 2023, by 20th Century Studios. The film has grossed $97 million on a budget of $80 million, and received generally positive reviews from critics.
Plot
In 2055, an artificial intelligence (AI) detonates a nuclear warhead over Los Angeles, California. In response, most of the Western nations wage war against AI to prevent humanity's extinction; they are being resisted by people of the so-called New Asia (consisting of East Asia, South Asia and Southeast Asia) who continue to embrace AI. The military seeks to assassinate "Nirmata", the mysterious chief architect behind the AI advancements. The USS NOMAD (North American Orbital Mobile Aerospace Defense) is developed as an advanced space station capable of launching destructive attacks from orbit.
U.S. Army sergeant Joshua Taylor is an undercover operative with his pregnant wife Maya, who the military believes to be the daughter of Nirmata. When military forces attack their home, exposing Taylor as a covert agent seeking to use Maya to find Nirmata, Maya runs away but is hit by a subsequent NOMAD strike.
Five years later, Taylor works as part of the ground zero cleanup crew in Los Angeles. He is approached by General Andrews and Colonel Howell to join a mission to destroy a new weapon engineered by Nirmata, "Alpha O", believed to be capable of destroying NOMAD and thus shifting the balance of the war in favor of AI. To recruit him, they play a video showing Maya alive, and suggest he might find and reunite with her if he joins the team. In New Asia, separated from the rest of the strike team, Taylor manages to enter the compound believed to hold the weapon but discovers only a robotic "simulant" in the form of a young girl. It is revealed that the girl has the ability to remotely control technology. Dubbing her "Alphie", Taylor disobeys Howell's orders to kill Alphie and the two travel to find Drew, Taylor's former commanding officer.
Examining Alphie, Drew tells Taylor she is capable of becoming the most powerful weapon on the planet as her abilities to control technology will grow exponentially. New Asian police attack Drew's apartment, killing his simulant girlfriend Kami, as Howell and squad member McBride close in. With Drew's help, Taylor locates Maya's beacon but does not find her before being attacked. Before Drew dies, he tells Taylor that the raid five years earlier had happened because of intelligence gathered that Maya was Nirmata. Taylor and Alphie are captured by New Asian forces led by Harun, a simulant soldier and former ally of Taylor's.
Harun states that the detonation in Los Angeles was caused by a human coding error, and that the U.S. government unfairly cast the blame on AI, who only wish to peacefully co-exist with humanity. After escaping his captors, Taylor rescues Alphie and prepares to flee as Howell leads an attack on the village. Alphie intervenes with her abilities but is gravely wounded by McBride. She is rushed to Maya, who Taylor learns has been in a coma since the strike on her home, tended to by simulant monks. Because simulants cannot harm Nirmata, she is "stranded" and unable to die. It is also revealed that Alphie was based on Taylor and Maya's unborn daughter, who had been scanned in utero. Distressed, Taylor takes Maya off life support as Howell and her forces arrive. They are killed by Harun, who tells Taylor NOMAD must be destroyed in order for the war to end.
Taylor and Alphie are captured by U.S. forces and taken to Los Angeles, where Taylor is forced to kill Alphie with an electroshock weapon. However, Andrews later discovers this to be a ruse, and the pair escapes before Alphie can be incinerated. Boarding a lunar shuttle at the Los Angeles Interplanetary Air and Space Port, Alphie forces the spacecraft to land aboard NOMAD just as Andrews orders a large-scale assault on remaining AI bases across the globe. Taylor plants a timed explosive while Alphie disables the ship's power. Before Taylor can arrive at the escape pod, Andrews activates a tentacled robot that prevents him from entering, and Taylor is forced to eject the vehicle with Alphie in it. As NOMAD explodes, halting the strike, Taylor embraces a simulant bearing Maya's likeness, whom Alphie had activated using a memory chip containing information Howell had downloaded from Maya’s brain just after she died. Taylor spends his last few moments with Maya as the NOMAD explodes, killing them both, while Alphie returns to Earth and witnesses the people celebrating NOMAD's destruction.
Cast
John David Washington as Sergeant Joshua Taylor, a military sergeant and undercover operative of the U.S. Army. He has an artificial right arm and left leg due to injuries he suffered during the nuclear explosion in Los Angeles, along with losing his parents and brother.
Madeleine Yuna Voyles as Alpha-O / "Alphie", a robotic simulant with the ability to remotely control technology.
Gemma Chan as Maya Fey-Taylor / Nirmata, the daughter and inheritor of the original Nirmata (the titular "Creator") and Joshua's wife. Chan also portrays multiple simulants throughout the movie with the appearance of the deceased Maya.
Allison Janney as Howell, a colonel in the U.S. Army who recruits Joshua. She harbors a deep prejudice against AIs due to losing both her sons in the war, one of whom was tortured by insurgents after being tricked by a simulant who seduced him.
Ken Watanabe as Harun, a simulant soldier in New Asia.
Sturgill Simpson as Drew, Joshua's former comrade and best friend.
Amar Chadha-Patel as Omni / Sek-on / Sergeant Bui, a citizen of New Asia who has donated his likeness to multiple simulants.
Marc Menchaca as McBride, a soldier in the U.S. Army who is part of Joshua's squad.
Robbie Tann as Shipley, a soldier in the U.S. Army who is part of Joshua's squad.
Ralph Ineson as Andrews, the main antagonist and a general in the U.S. Army who recruits Joshua.
Michael Esper as Cotton, the captain of Joshua's squad.
Veronica Ngo as Kami, Drew's simulant girlfriend.
Production
Development
Development on the film began in November 2019, when Gareth Edwards signed on to direct and write an untitled science fiction project for New Regency to produce, along with Edwards' Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016) co-producer Kiri Hart serving as producer. A test shoot and location scouting was conducted that year, with Edwards using it as the opportunity to envision the look of the film. He described the process as "I took a camera and a 1970s anamorphic lens, we went location-scouting in Vietnam, Cambodia, Japan, Indonesia, Thailand, and Nepal. Our whole plan was just to go to the greatest locations in the world, because the cost of a flight is way less than the cost of building a set. We were going to hopscotch around the world and shoot this film, then layer in the science-fiction on top afterwards. If our film is trying to achieve something visually, it's trying to feel real in terms of science-fiction."
In February 2020, Edwards was officially announced as director. Edwards cited films such as Apocalypse Now (1979), Baraka (1992), Blade Runner (1982), Akira (1988), Rain Man (1988), The Hit (1984), E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) and Paper Moon (1973) as this film's sources of inspiration.
Casting
In May 2021, John David Washington was announced to star, and the film's working title was revealed to be True Love. In June 2021, Gemma Chan, Danny McBride, and Benedict Wong entered negotiations to star. The involvements of Chan and Wong were confirmed in January 2022, with Allison Janney, Sturgill Simpson, and Marc Menchaca joining the cast. Simpson was reported to be taking over for McBride who departed due to scheduling conflicts. In February 2022, Ken Watanabe joined the cast to replace Wong, who also had to drop out due to scheduling conflicts; Watanabe had previously worked with Edwards on Godzilla (2014).
Filming
On a production budget of $80 million, principal photography began in Thailand on January 17, 2022, with Greig Fraser (who also serves as a co-producer) and Oren Soffer serving as cinematographers, and COVID-19 safety precautions in place. To give the film the feel of classic Hollywood epics such as Ben-Hur (1959), the filmmakers opted to shoot the film in the 2.76:1 ultra-wide aspect ratio.
Among the on-site filming locations in Thailand are Suvarnabhumi Airport, Ban Mung, Sangkhla Buri, Chiang Dao, and Sam Phan Bok. As the trailer was released, hyped-up Thai fans also pointed out a scene shot at Makkasan station of Bangkok's ARL.
For their duties, Fraser was involved in the pre-production process before moving to working remotely due to his commitment to Dune: Part Two (2024), while Soffer, for his first major studio film, served as the main director of photography throughout the production shoot. In an interview with Total Film, Edwards, who also served as one of the camera operators, commended Soffer and what he brought to the film's production, calling him a "real future rising star in the DoP world. He's super-smart. He's got a great eye." The film was shot on the prosumer Sony FX3 camera, the low cost of which is a rarity for a blockbuster film. Edwards confirmed the camera's usage at the "Directors on Directing" panel at the 2023 San Diego Comic-Con, where director and fellow panelist Louis Leterrier noted that this creative decision could "change cinema" forever. In light of the budget, the filmmakers utilized guerrilla filmmaking methods by having very few crew members and natural lighting on set for select on-location scenes, and limited sound recording. Rather than build sets, or rely exclusively on digital methods such as greenscreens or StageCraft, the production found it was more cost effective to pay to send a small crew to film in 80 locations around the world which came closest to matching the desired sci-fi look. Then, only once the film had finalised the edit would visual effects be layered into the image. Using this method for visual effects, Edwards estimated the production spent only $80 million on a project which would have typically cost $300 million. Filming wrapped on May 30, 2022.
Visual effects and post-production
The visual effects were provided by Industrial Light & Magic, SDFX Studios, Yannix, Virtuos, Weta Workshop Folks VFX, MARZ, Misc Studios, Fin Design + Effects, Outpost VFX, Lekker VFX, Crafty Apes, Jellyfish Pictures, Proof, Territory Studio, Atomic Arts and VFX Los Angeles James Clyne, who worked as a concept artist on Rogue One, reunited with Edwards on this film as its production designer.
One of the most significant elements of the film is the fictional U.S. military space station NOMAD, which was noted for its distinctive visual design and sound effects. Edwards revealed that it took the entirety of the lockdowns caused by the COVID-19 pandemic to design it, describing the ship as "a bird of prey and an all-seeing eye in the sky, always looking at everybody. So we kept playing with those two shapes and merging them in a way until it just felt right." Erik Aadahl and Ethan Van der Ryn, who worked with Edwards on Godzilla (2014), provided the sound effects work for the ship, described as "a dance, is probably the nice way to say it, between music and sound, and it's never a fight". The assembly cut of the film, which ran for 5 hours, did not use any temp tracks for the music and just the sound design, which Edwards likened to that of the talkies during the late-1920s. Because of this, it was decided that no music be added to the film throughout the entire editing process in order to get the pacing and story structure right in an efficient manner. Edwards called the experience "super interesting. Part of me thinks that I would do that again, because it puts a lot of pressure on the sound design, but then you're not hiding behind music to save the storytelling."
Music
On July 17, 2023, Edwards confirmed on the film's Twitter account that Hans Zimmer was hired to score the film. On September 19, 2023, Edwards revealed that he initially planned on having a company specialising in AI-generated music replicate Zimmer's style of music. Although the process gave him satisfying results, Edwards instead chose Zimmer to originally score the film. The soundtrack was digitally released by Hollywood Records on September 29, 2023.
Marketing
A first look at the film was shown at CinemaCon on April 26, 2023, with Anthony D'Alessandro of Deadline Hollywood praising the production design, saying that it made "Blade Runner look like child's play". It was also announced that the title was renamed from True Love to The Creator. Edwards later explained why the title was changed, saying that it "sounded too much like a romantic comedy, and that message would confuse potential audiences who weren't familiar with the film's plot or trailer."
The film's teaser trailer, set to a remix of Aerosmith's "Dream On", premiered online on May 17, 2023. The official trailer was released on July 17, 2023, three days after the beginning of the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike. James Whitbrook of Gizmodo and EJ Tangonan of JoBlo.com found the move coincidental, given the similarities between the film's premise and SAG-AFTRA's fears of the film studios using artificial intelligence to replicate the likenesses of actors without compensation. Edwards agreed with this take, saying "I have a trick with AI is to get the timing as a sweet spot window where it's before the apocalypse and not after, which I think it's in November — maybe December — and so, I think we got really lucky...The joke would be that when you write a film, especially a science fiction film, I try to avoid putting a date...at some point, you have to so, I picked 2070. Now I feel like an idiot because I should’ve gone for 2023 'cause everything that's been unfolding in the last few months is kind of scary and weird."
Exclusive footage from one of the film's battle sequences and a first listen to some of Zimmer's score were presented at the 2023 San Diego Comic-Con on July 21, 2023. A behind-the-scenes featurette introducing Edwards' vision for the film and featuring interviews with the cast was released on August 21, 2023. An IMAX fan event showcasing exclusive footage from the film with a live Q&A with Edwards took place in select IMAX theaters nationwide on August 29, 2023, one month before the film's release.
Publicity stunts were also conducted in September 2023 when actors dressed as "AI robots" depicted in the film appeared during a National Football League game between the Los Angeles Chargers and the Miami Dolphins at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, a Major League Baseball game between the San Diego Padres and the St. Louis Cardinals at Petco Stadium in San Diego, and the first race of the Autotrader EchoPark Automotive 400 at Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth, Texas. A book showcasing concept artwork and a behind-the-scenes look at the making of the film, written by James Mottram, will be published by Insight Editions and released by Simon & Schuster on November 14, 2023.
Controversy
On July 17, 2023, the official trailer for The Creator received negative criticism for using footage from the 2020 Beirut explosion as a visual effects plate shot of a futuristic Los Angeles being obliterated by a nuclear explosion. It was first noticed by a Reddit user and was subsequently covered by the YouTube channel Corridor Crew as part of their "VFX Artists React" series.
On September 15, 2023, during a Reddit AMA with Gareth Edwards, he revealed that the alleged footage was never meant to be included in the trailer in the first place and that it is typical in filmmaking that archival footage be used as placeholders for VFX shots, while revealing that the shot is not in the film itself.
Release
An early press and industry screening of the The Creator, originally meant to have been its world premiere until being impacted by the 2023 Hollywood labor disputes, took place at the TCL Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles on September 18, 2023, with props and costumes from the film on display in the lobby. Edwards was also present and voiced his support for the film's cast, who could not attend and promote the film due to the strikes, in a speech before the film began. The film held its Texas premiere at Fantastic Fest on September 26, 2023, with a special screening as the opening night film of Beyond Fest that same day at the Aero Theatre in Santa Monica, California. The film's United Kingdom premiere took place on September 26, 2023, at The Science Museum, South Kensington in London.
It was released on September 29, 2023 in both conventional theaters and in IMAX, Dolby Cinema, 4DX and ScreenX, just two days after the end of the 2023 Writers Guild of America strike. It competed for opening weekend attendance with Paramount Pictures' PAW Patrol: The Mighty Movie and Lionsgate's Saw X. It had been originally set to be released on October 6, 2023 before it was announced at CinemaCon on April 26, 2023 that the film would be moving up a week.
Reception
Box office
, The Creator has grossed $39 million in the United States and Canada, and $58.8 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $97.7 million.
In the United States and Canada, The Creator was released alongside PAW Patrol: The Mighty Movie, Saw X, and the wide expansion of Dumb Money, and was projected to gross $16–19 million from 3,680 theaters in its opening weekend. It made $5.6 million on its first day, including $1.6 million from Thursday night previews. It went on to debut to $14.1 million, finishing third at the box office. $3 million of the gross came from IMAX screens, while men made up at 71% of the audience, with 51% between the ages of 18-34. The film made $6.1 million and $4.3 million in its second and third weekend, finishing in fifth both times.
Prior to its release, Cindy White of The A.V. Club cited the mid-teen estimates as due to being an original film not based on an existing IP, cast and filmmakers not being entirely household names (save for Washington and Janney), poor timing of the release in the midst of societal and governmental issues regarding generative AI's place in everyday life, and lackluster marketing and promotion due in-part to the ongoing 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Ben Sherlock of ScreenRant thought being released in the midst of public debates over AI was a positive for the film rather than a negative and attributed the poor performance to its Rotten Tomatoes score and the price of cinema tickets. Following its $14 million opening weekend, Richard Lawson of Vanity Fair expressed hope that the film could become a sleeper hit given its healthier performance overseas, saying: "The film's plotting may be derivative, its twists and emotional beats predictable. But there is still something rare and special in its execution; it's Denis Villeneuve without the cold fussiness, the lacquered preening. Now that Edwards is free of Star Wars (though his Star Wars movie is a good one), he is a filmmaker to be fostered and encouraged, so that he might make ever more arresting entertainments like The Creator."
Critical response
The film received mostly positive reviews from critics, who praised its visual effects, cinematography, action sequences, and Edwards' direction, but criticized the screenplay and themes. Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale, while those polled at PostTrak gave it an 81% overall positive score, with 61% saying they would definitely recommend the film.
Maggie Lovitt of Collider wrote that "The script might have glaring flaws and painfully ambiguous morals, but The Creator is a truly remarkable piece of original science fiction storytelling." Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian called it an "intriguing, stimulating, exhilarating movie, which really does address – with both head and heart – the great issue of our age, AI." Pete Hammond of Deadline Hollywood called it "one of the most thought-provoking movies in some time, one to which attention must be paid."
Brian Truitt of USA Today described it as "a movie that makes you think about existence and the world around you, explodes your brain with cool visuals and sufficiently blows stuff up." Alex Godfrey of Empire called it "An inspired, soulful piece of sci-fi, the endlessly stunning visuals all in service of a heartfelt, sensitive story. Gareth Edwards is the real deal — this is fantastic, enveloping cinema."
A.A. Dowd of IGN wrote that "As pure spectacle, The Creator is often jaw-dropping in its imagery, its relatively frugal special effects, and the detailed depth of its futuristic design. It's shakier as drama and sci-fi..." Graeme Guttmann of Screen Rant wrote that "While the film's story may feel overstuffed and its action sequences repetitive at times, The Creators bold vision and willingness to take risks make it a more exhilarating experience than safe, mediocre blockbusters."
Tomris Laffly of TheWrap called it "a film that works better as an allegory for acceptance rather than a warning against AI", and that "even if you can't look past such glaring miscalculations, The Creator will still feel like a visually fulfilling journey that had been worth taking in the aftermath. Nowadays, there is absolutely nothing like it out there."
Joey Magidson of Awards Radar wrote "You've never seen anything quite like this movie, which is a saying that gets bandied about a lot, but is pretty apt here...There was potential for an instant classic movie. We're not quite there, but what we've got is still damn good," while naming it a frontrunner for the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects.
Jake Cole of Slant praised the visual effects, writing that "The robots, which run a stylistic range from logical extrapolations of present-day models by companies like Boston Dynamics to the not-quite-perfect human simulacra of A.I. Artificial Intelligence, all look not only plausible but physically present." Rodrigo Perez of The Playlist called it "A familiar mélange and pastiche of sci-fi-tropes you've seen and felt before, filmmaker Gareth Edwards' science-fiction drama, The Creator, is recognizable but, nonetheless, largely compelling."
Reviews were not uniformly positive. David Ehrlich of IndieWire described it as "A.I. Artificial Intelligence meets Children of Men" and wrote that "The most fundamental reason why The Creator, for all of its shortcomings and clichés, ultimately sold me on its optimism is that it succeeds as a blueprint where it fails as a movie." David Rooney of The Hollywood Reporter was mixed, calling it a "baggy, sentimental sci-fi epic," while Peter Debruge of Variety thought that it "can hardly even keep its premise straight".
Mark Jenkins of The Washington Post wrote that the film "fails to develop the personalities and relationships that would give its central characters an affecting humanity." Jesse Hassenger of Paste wrote that "For a designated last great hope of original sci-fi, this is a surprisingly programmatic picture."
Rafael Motamayor of /Film called it "visually stunning" but "a predictable and dumbed-down story that feels like Edwards doing James Camerons Avatar in terms of presenting bold worldbuilding and sci-fi ideas, but without the emotional resonance of that giant film. This is a very cool movie, but not necessarily a very good one." Glenn Whipp of the Los Angeles Times felt the film lacked originality, writing that "there's precious little in The Creator that feels fresh, particularly if you’ve seen one of the first two Terminator movies, watched The Last of Us or bought your kid (OK, yourself) a Baby Yoda plush toy."
Fionnuala Halligan of Screen International wrote that it "lacks the intellectual depth or ambition of the films it references - from Apocalypse Now to Blade Runner, The Terminator, Star Wars and beyond to the imagery of Kundun." Nicolas Rapold of The New York Times criticized the film's tone and wrote that "Edwards pushes the relatable ordinariness of the androids and hybrid "simulants", but the potential menace of A.I. inescapably looms."
Richard Roeper of Chicago Sun-Times called it "A great-looking but strange and mostly unsuccessful hybrid of futuristic sci-fi thrillers and Vietnam War films that combines elements of everything from District 9 to Blade Runner to Ex Machina to the Terminator franchise..."
Notes
References
External links
2020s American films
2020s English-language films
2023 science fiction action films
20th Century Studios films
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IMAX films
ScreenX films
Advertising and marketing controversies in film
American epic films
American post-apocalyptic films
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American science fiction war films
Films about artificial intelligence
Films about the United States Army
Films affected by the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike
Films directed by Gareth Edwards
Films impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic
Films scored by Hans Zimmer
Films set in 2055
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