2015’s been a solid year so far for first time directors (excluding The Duff), first with David Robert Mitchell’s It Follows and now with Alex Garland’s Ex Machina. I’m going to briefly ignore some of the usual aspects a reviewer would critique (plot, character, theme, music, etc…) to praise the film’s most striking aspect, its cinematography. Ex Machina is a visually gorgeous film, with every scene containing some form of pure eye candy. The setting ranges from imposing mountainous landscapes, lush green fields, a scenic river surrounded by glaciers, and an ominous building with an inside of various mechanical features (the film was shot in Valldal, Norway, a place I would love to visit). The setting superbly enhances Ex Machina’s thriller aspects in a natural way, with its vast isolation from civilization and claustrophobic rooms underground; the film could have been without characters and still remained more captivating than the average thriller.
