Alex Garland is a novelist, screenwriter, and a film director from London, England. Throughout his career, he has contributed to a myriad of films and has written two novels. One of these novels is The Beach which was published in 1996. The Beach begins in Bangkok, Thailand where Richard, a backpacker from England, finds an ominous map to a secluded beach supposedly untouched by tourists and regular civilization. Richard hears rumors of the beach being considered Eden and that it inhabits a community free of the conflict and toll of normal human life. Richard takes some fellow travelers he met in Bangkok with him on his voyage to the beach. Over the course of almost a year living on the beach, Richard realizes the utopia he was searching for does not exist.
Along with being a novelist, Garland has written and directed many films, one of them being Ex Machina which was released in 2014. The film follows a young programmer named Caleb who was invited to participate in experiments involving major advancements in artificial intelligence. During these experiments, Caleb must determine if the robot girl he is having conversations with does or does not have human-like consciousness.
A common theme in Alex Garland’s many works is the truth of human nature. In The Beach the island society was created to be a place where only good can happen. The self-appointed leader of the community named Sal does everything in her power to protect their Eden, from assigning jobs to preventing certain people from entering the beach. At first, Richard is amazed at how perfect everything is though it was clear from the beginning the society was far from perfect. Eden cannot exist because there are horrible things that happen in society that are completely unavoidable. Things like illness, injuries, war, and death are aspects of human society that will always be present no matter how hard someone might try to prevent them.
Ex Machina asks the question: What does it mean to be human? During the experiments Caleb does with the artificial intelligence hosted by a robot girl named Ava, he is fully aware that Ava is not human. Even with this being true, Caleb falls in love with Ava and is later manipulated by her in order to escape and join normal society. Even with Ava being so incredibly human-like, she lacks empathy. This makes it easy for her to take advantage of Caleb and later leave him behind. There will always be a gap between a human being and artificial intelligence because there are some human characteristics that cannot be replicated by a machine.
I have a huge appreciation for Alex Garland’s work. Stories that revolve around aspects of humanity inspire thoughts and opinions about the topic. I find myself thinking about the concepts Garland conveys through his writing and directing. I think a good place of art can be determined by the way it affects one’s life and through strong ideas the project conveys.
