This seems like a classic story of human vs machine, only that nowadays the fear keeps getting higher as technology improves and robots becoming familiar with everyday people’s lives become less of a new thing. According to market forecasts, by 2024 the virtual assistant sector is potentially going to be worth $11.3bn up from $2.2bn in 2018. Technology has turned into a walking stick for mankind. The love for technology by humans has gone up in the last ten years considerably leading to a case where man would not run an efficient life system when the technology is taken away.
Steven Soderbergh’s recent release Kimi touches upon the potentials impacts of one’s privacy being invaded through technological advancements and corporate greed but then Jean-Pierre Jeunet, who brought us Amélie , takes his turn on this futuristic world where machines yearn to be understood. The concept led to Netflix’s release Bigbug as a film project. It defies our expectations of similar films, it also brings forth unique visual experience that are thought-provoking.
In this world of BiugBug, it is already in 2045 and humans have passed most of their day-to-day tasks on to androids. These androids can speak, read intentions from eyes alone, display enhanced speed and strength among other enhancements. In French suburban areas now there emerges multiple pastel-colored cookie-cutter homes perfectly manicured lawns inside living rooms filled with greenhouses and TVs that look like holograms.Sounds amazing right? But all good things are fleeting away when there is a traffic jam which marks the beginning of an Android Revolution.
A TV show playing as background noise during their conversation introduces some androids called Yonyx (all played by François Levental). The first scene will set you in what is happening later: here we see androids keeping humans as literal pets.The humans go around on all fours wearing tails and barking and growling at each other in a street. Instantly, the power relationship has been structured around ownership and control with Yonyx having this as its main aim.
They want to reclaim their previous owners which are human beings; something that one of the Yonyx members is now able to achieve when he gets enough momentum to become a politician. These don’t seem like trustworthy Yonyx.They have huge and unnatural smiles, helmets covering their heads on the sides, and enjoy mistreating humans. To mankind, they emerge as outsiders who pose a threat to the bubble they live in. This concept develops further because the androids keep main cast locked inside home while causing mayhem through their comradeship with Yonyx.
Bigbug assembles a cast of characters which are all familiar and have been seen in other movies. Elsa Zylberstein plays the role of Alice who is a divorced woman living in this house for most parts of the movie. Max played by Stéphane de Groodt and his son Hélie Thonnat are Alice’s first visitors at her humble abode and Max is out to get what he wants. His mission is to bed Alice, and he will stop at nothing until he does so. When her ex-husband arrives with his new girlfriend, tension rises from each passing remark that slowly awakens her jealousy. Guest neighbors Françoise (Isabelle Nanty), brings over her dog’s multiple clones before creating disorder.
The characters represented here differ from one another, thereby leading to several conflicts among them. In trying to understand human emotions these robots both observe their owners’ conducts and read books thus learning how humans are always trapped by basic feelings. Scenes like these abound throughout the film where a moment seems right, only to be spoiled by an android entering into it with a joke. Outdoor advertisements come up straight to the window interacting with humans which may evoke fascination or irritation in people.
Being inside Alice’s house reminds us of all those things that one would recognize even though we live in an advanced world: rows of bookcases filled with old books, calligraphy written using ink pen whereas Smeg refrigerator also features here. There is something nostalgic about Alice herself too; for instance, she dresses like a sixties’ or fifties’ housewife especially when her android made Monique stands beside her.
Monique looks every bit like future robotized maid could be imagined to appear like. Blue-streaked blunt bob hairdo defines her as something not human; besides, she has on silver maid costume which somehow resembles typical dress code from science fiction films. It is evident that she appears different from others because she is not human.
Other robots in the house include Einstein, built by Alice’s ex-husband, a talking head, Tom who is backward and old-fashioned android as well as Nestor – the home artificial intelligence. These androids remember the favoritism shown to them by Alice while Yonyx begin their revolt even if they never saw them as anything else apart from household appliances. It is this passion driving the robots that can liberate them so that they are able to choose their destiny with Yonyx getting closer.
Another theme of this film might be described as rejecting what makes people human. Alice and her daughter Nina live in a world that actually existed before it was destroyed through books and computers even if they have no memory of it. A simple meal cooks through a series of machinery, and a table cannot be moved without the help of artificial intelligence.
Even intimacy, for characters like Françoise, is through a robot. The movie’s heart is probably that: the Yonyx tend to be anti-humanistic and inhuman, so even human beings on earth have forgotten what it means to be human. However, this film waits until there are emergency lights wailing and a group of terrified residents including robots unknowingly surround it; the Yonyx appear. It doesn’t separate between humans and robots in terms of punishment that has been enforced upon them.
But Bigbug becomes an interesting movie outside the main line due to all these incidents being normalized. This implies that we are still almost in the present world as shown by books and Macbook computers, 2045. You can see where the plot is going but you’re still nervous when your TV switches onto a program where an android is tormenting humans while no one else seems to care about it. What this suggests is that it has become normal for Alice and Nina to have such robotic helpers.
Alice and Nina would be dead after they lost their robotic assistants except for empty nostalgia filled with cultural artifacts from some remote ephemeral past. Of course, throughout the film, one thing stands out more than others-robots trying desperately to acquire humanity-not brains. At least by the end of this film, they were standing tall with grinning faces saying “We are human.”
It shows that study of emotion and empathy brings about humanism which was not seen at all by any human being at the beginning of this movie? Where did humans go off track according to Bigbug? In addition is small talk about capitalism, technology developments and community development besides other issues surrounding us today.
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