VOD film review: After Yang
Review Overview
Humanity
8Heart
8Dance moves
8Ivan Radford | On 02, Jan 2023
Director: Kogonada
Cast: Colin Farrell, Justin H Min, Jodie Turner-Smith, Malea Emma Tjandrawidjaja
Certificate: 15
What makes humans human? Cinema – and science-fiction in particular – has long enjoyed grappling with that question and the latest to do so is a beautiful, understated addition to the canon. The sophomore feature from Columbus director Kogonada more than delivers on his debut’s promise, with a muted fragility that’s as movingly delicate as it is carefully paced.
Based on a short story by Alexander Weinstein, it takes us into the near future, where Jake (Colin Farrell) and Kyra (Jodie Turner-Smith) have purchased an AI companion for their adopted daughter, Mika (Malea Emma Tjandrawidjaja), who is called Yang (Justin H Min). Programmed to have knowledge of Chinese history, he’s designed to help Mika learn about and understand her heritage. But when he unexpectedly powers down, Jake has to find a way to get the secondhand “techno-sapien” repaired, while Mika mourns the lost of her brother.
Yang, we soon learn, was bought secondhand and is therefore outside of any official warranty period. That leads Jake into a black market of repairers, who not only open up Yang’s internal wiring but also the thorny complications of artificial intelligence being integrated into humans’ day-to-day lives – from data and privacy to relationships and unconscious caste systems.
There’s a huge amount of complexity simmering below the gorgeously realised surface, and Kogonada’s script takes its time to walk us through the impressive world-building, from technology museums to a coffee shop barista (Haley Lu Richardson). Along the way, the film deftly picks apart what happens when we rely on technology, quietly questions the line between artificial intelligence and biological intelligence and ponders the distinction between digital recordings and human memories.
The cast all step into these modern grey areas with heartfelt performances, from Malea Emma Tjandrawidjaja’s gentle grappling with grief and Jodie Turner-Smith’s desire to protect their daughter to Justin H Min’s thoughtful, poignant presence in flashbacks as Yang, who longs for a deeper connection to human nature. At the heart of them all is Colin Farrell, who, after The Batman and The Banshees of Inisherin, completes a trio of remarkable turns in 2022, his furrowed brow capturing a moving mix of loss, love and a growing understanding that some things in life can’t be fixed or undone. Sprinkled with surprising song and dance moves, the result is a melancholic, low-key meditation on connections and the way that they can live on in the most unexpected ways.