In his formidable directorial debut, screenwriter Alex Garland crafts a modern parable of the information age with this meticulously designed sci-fi thriller. Erotically charged by a star-making performance from Alicia Vikander as Ava, an AI-enabled robot, the film avoids femme fatale and monster movie tropes, instead making the character a source of sympathy. Oscar Isaac plays, with signature gravitas, her Frankensteinian creator, Nathan, a genius search engine maven using data analytics to replicate the human mind. Rounding out the compact cast is a spot-on Domhnall Gleeson as the gifted but naive techie recruited to test Ava's ability to pass for human via a week-long Turing test. It is the trio's daily interactions within the confines of a sequestered research facility that expose each individual's true nature.

The characters' dialogue, which drives much of the film, is by turns heady with biotechnological jargon, darkly comic through Nathan's booze-splashed barbs toward his slightly less brilliant mentee, and tragically ironic, as Ava reflects on possessing immense talents while she remains hidden from an outside world that might champion them. These conversations, along with the physical staging of the actors therein, are rife with sexual implications - a running commentary on the permanence of lust in the digital realm. Further enhancing the sense of isolation are intercut shots of the compound's unsullied natural surroundings, continuous reminders that any aid is a distant helicopter flight away.

As the traditional hero, villain and damsel roles begin to shift within the group, we retroactively question each player's actual motivation. It's the film's delight in subverting expectations that commands audience attention through the pull-no-punches finale, which is at once ruthless and hopeful. In providing his cast an engaging script not without its share of twists, and one wide open to interpretation, Garland constructs a fascinating and acute vision of the near future.

Final Grade: A- | 94/100 | ★★★½