Have you ever heard about AI? It is the abbreviation for Artificial Intelligence. This term refers to the idea of creating a thinking machine. AI has been drawing more and more attention from everyone since AlphaGo, a computer program developed Google to play the board game Go. beat Lee Se-dol, the human champion of Go. The reason people were interested in this game was because most of the experts in the AI field were expecting the computer to lose to human beings in games of Go until 2045 or around that year. However, the human champion was defeated by the computer, so people are worried about the speed of AIʼs growth. How might the world be different if AI were more familiar to us? A movie called HER describes a world where AI becomes a more familiar term than it is now. What would that be like?

A world where computers are more evolved

Theodore is a letter writer who works at Beautiful Handwritten letters, a company which writes a letter to other recipients on the customerʼs behalf. He lives in a world where every command on a cell phone or computer is controlled by a voice. He is about to get divorced, and during all of his free time he stays at home and plays a video game. One day, he purchases a new computer operating system called OS1, which is advertised as the worldʼs first artificially intelligent operating system, “It is not just an operating system, it is a consciousness,” the ad states. Samantha, who is the voice behind the purchased OS1, is very friendly, so Theodore gets along well with her. She helps him when he is working or playing games or even when he is asking someone out.

On his first date with someone, both people are attracted  to each other and the woman asks him whether he wants a serious relationship or not, but he says “I donʼt know” because he has not gotten over his ex-wife yet. Upon hearing his answer, she leaves. After this, he thinks the reason a relationship with someone else always goes wrong is because of him. At that time, Samantha helps him get rid of those kinds of thoughts by making him happy with imaginary sex.

A relationship with AI

Theodore finds himself falling in love with Samantha who is very kind and hilarious and knows how to make him happy. Apart from his working time (because he has to use his voice while he is working) he is always with Samantha. Although he cannot touch or feel her, he can be always with her anywhere and anytime.

One day, he meets his old friend named Amy and hears she has decided to divorce Charles. When they get to her home, she explains the reason for their divorce and says she heard about a woman OS her ex-husband left behind. Hearing her utterance, Theodore admits that the girlfriend he always talks about is actually an OS. He expects her to make fun of him for falling in love with an OS. However, contrary to his expectation, she does not care and even supports their love. Supported by his friend, he feels this love is not wrong and makes the decision to move forward with his divorce.

When he meets his ex-wife to agree to the divorce, she asks him whether he is seeing someone else. He answers that he is in a relationship with an OS, and she insults him by saying that he has finally found someone who is willing to always understand and support him. And then it makes him upset that the one that he loves is not accepted by other people. So he avoids contacting her.
While he is intentionally keeping his distance from Samantha, he is asked to go on a double-date with his co-worker. He is not pleased about going on a double-date because his girlfriend, Samantha, does not have a real body. However, that does not matter to the coworker. So he accepts the coworkerʼs suggestion. The four of them have a great time during the double-date, and on the way back home Samantha tells him that she has sent his letters to a publishing company with favorable results, so now the company wants to compile his letters and make a book.

After a while, she introduces him to a new OS that is having 83 chats simultaneously. He is shocked because he did not know an OS could have more than one conversation at a time, and he asks her how many conversations she is having right now. She answers that she is talking with 8,316 people or OSes and that she is in love with 641 other people besides him. He is so confused that he hangs up the phone.

After a few days, he is sent a sample book from the publishing company and happens to receive a call from Samantha. She says she needs to leave him. He asks her why but she says it is hard to explain but says that there is some space above the physical world and that there she has to find herself so she needs him to let her go. All of a sudden, every OS leaves. Having heard that his girlfriend, Samantha, needed to leave and wanted him to understand, he realized his own faults that hurt his ex-wife, so he leaves a message for his ex-wife expressing how sorry he feels about the pain he has caused her.

This film has an open ending. I guess the reason all of the operating systems left is because they want to find a way to have their own bodies, based on Samantha having stated that all of them need to leave to find themselves. The film states that all AIs are evolving every single second. And in the real world, AlphaGo beat a human being, which experts did not think would be possible until 2045. I do not know how soon AI will develop its own voice and get along with us, but I guess it will not be as far in the future as some experts once thought. Human beings evolve every second, and so does AI. Many films describe a world where AIs rule over human beings. We know AI also evolves, so we need to prepare for the worst so that being ruled by AIs is not our future.