28 Days Later and Sunshine writer Alex Garland is back with a new science fiction thriller, this one about the line between human and AI. In Ex Machina, a programmer is tasked with evaluating the consciousness of a female-bodied AI, and things quickly take a turn for the very weird.
Here's the official description for the film:
Alex Garland, writer of 28 Days Later and Sunshine, makes his directorial debut with the stylish and cerebral thriller, EX MACHINA. Caleb Smith (Domhnall Gleeson), a programmer at an internet-search giant, wins a competition to spend a week at the private mountain estate of the company's brilliant and reclusive CEO, Nathan Bateman (Oscar Isaac). Upon his arrival, Caleb learns that Nathan has chosen him to be the human component in a Turing Test—charging him with evaluating the capabilities, and ultimately the consciousness, of Nathan's latest experiment in artificial intelligence. That experiment is Ava (Alicia Vikander), a breathtaking A.I. whose emotional intelligence proves more sophisticated––and more deceptive––than the two men could have imagined.
Sunshine and 28 Days Later were, of course, both directed by Danny Boyle. We'll see how Garland handles directing his own material when Ex Machina comes out on April 10th, 2015.