Kogonada’s new AFTER YANG plays in many ways like a mirror to Steven Spielberg’s misunderstood android epic A.I. ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE as it explores ideas about human nature through the experiences of an artificial being. It’s also an unusually warm, thematically rich science-fiction film that opens up countless avenues of discussion, a few of which we travel down before bringing AFTER YANG into conversation with Spielberg’s earlier model to consider these stories’ shared features: a disrupted family unit, a journey of discovery, adoption ethics, and rumination on what it means to be human.

Please share your comments, thoughts, and questions about A.I. ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE, AFTER YANG, or anything else in the world of film, by sending an email to [email protected]. We may respond to it on our Patreon (patreon.com/NextPictureShow), where you can also find bonus episodes, a weekly newsletter, recommendations, and more. 

Works Cited:

• ”What the Year’s Best Sci-Fi Movie Has to Say About Asian Identity and Adoption” by Sam Adams (slate.com)

• “After Yang intentionally subverts sci-fi’s fetishistic ‘hollow Asian’ trope” by Leo Kim (polygon.com)

• “After Yang Is a Gorgeous Movie About the Life and Death of a Robot” by Alison Willmore (vulture.com)

Outro music: Mitski, “Glide”

Next pairing: Tobe Hooper’s THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE and Ti West’s X

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