Already deep into a second Cold War, Britain’s Ministry of Defense seeks a game-changing weapon. Programmer Vincent McCarthy unwittingly provides an answer in The Machine, a super-strong human cyborg. When a programming bug causes the prototype to decimate his lab, McCarthy takes his obsessive efforts underground, far away from inquisitive eyes.
Good British sci-fis don't come along very often, so this stylish slice of a dystopian near-future should be welcomed by fans.
– Anna Smith,
Time Out,
18 Mar 2014
fresh:
A classy slice of cerebral sci-fi with a literary-cinematic heritage stretching back through Blade Runner and Metropolis to Frankenstein.
– Stephen Dalton,
Hollywood Reporter,
21 Apr 2014
rotten:
The Machine brings little new to the subject save for an ominously ambiguous conclusion about the consequences of making computers more advanced than their human masters.
– Nick Schager,
Village Voice,
22 Apr 2014
rotten:
"The Machine" works modestly well, but still wobbles trying to balance its "thinking man's sci-fi" aspirations against the need to placate less adventurous fans via standard action content.
– Dennis Harvey,
Variety,
23 Apr 2014
fresh:
"The Machine" percolates with an elegantly palpable sense of wonder and danger.