This is just a masterpiece now as far as I’m concerned. I’ve seen it that innumerable number of times and it just always gets me intensely emotional. I understand it completely, every single image, shot, line of dialogue, action, carries some meaning, and I just get the whole thing, like the whole movie was made only for me, I get it. So many people hate the ending: I think it’s absolutely mesmerizingly beautiful. The score is one of John Williams’ best, if not the best.

In addition to those who simply hate the movie, I can’t understand those who claim that Kubrick (who planned to direct the movie himself, from like decades earlier) would’ve made a better movie. This movie is Kubrick all over to me; it’s certainly more Kubrick than Spielberg. Heck, it’s more Lucas than Spielberg. Check out the complete change of story that lands almost exactly on the 50 minute mark, when we fade out on David being left alone in the woods and fade in on our first look at Gigalo Joe. Kubrick used to do this a lot, off the top of my head in Full Metal Jacket (from the suicide to ‘Nam) and A Clockwork Orange (I think the first is where Alex is arrested). Instead of the usual 30-60-30 minute structure, it’s the 50-50-50 structure (AI’s a little shorter than that).

I was babbling a little after watching this tonight and I stumbled across something I hadn’t thought about before. I was talking about how the visual effects will never age in this movie (and I’m sure they won’t: they’re simply perfect), then I added that the story itself might become obsolete, even if the effects don’t. That’s kind of scary, because all the things this movie addresses could be entirely possible even within a couple few decades. Then, I guess that makes the whole theme of the movie even more hopeful: if you want something bad enough, even if it seems impossible, or even just if people are telling you it’s impossible, just believe in it long enough, and one day it will be possible, because one day, everything will. Such a great movie to watch the same day as Finding Neverland, lol, now my brain is totally screwed :-p