Media and Music: A Case Study of Ex Machina

The way movies use their underlying scores can completely draw us into their tone and plot, and the score for “Ex Machina” cleverly deceives audiences in unique ways.

In Film and Music, our writers take a deep dive into how movies use scores and songs to engage viewers, give new meaning and tone to some of our favorite scenes, and establish themes. It almost goes without saying, but there are spoilers abound.

Written by Minnah Zaheer

Photo courtesy of BBC

Music in film has a long and extensive history, with some of our favorite movie scenes perfectly framed around one specific song. But those moments in time where music is placed at the forefront give us just a glimpse of the potential a film’s score can have on engaging its viewers. “Ex Machina,” a 2015 science-fiction thriller directed by Alex Garland and scored by Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury, showcases a different effect by utilizing its score as a plot device to keep us hooked from the beginning and never let us go.

“Ex Machina,” tells the story of Caleb (Domhnall Gleeson), a computer programmer who is invited to participate in a study conducted by his CEO, the mysterious but extremely brilliant Nathan (Oscar Isaac). When Caleb arrives at Nathan’s secluded home, he learns that Nathan has built a humanoid AI, named Ava (Alicia Vikander). Nathan’s task for Caleb is to test Ava’s humanity, as well as her capacity for thought and consciousness. Caleb’s increased interactions with Ava and his growing distrust of Nathan lead him to get closer to Ava than he or Nathan ever expected.

The film continually redefines what exactly humanity entails, using purposeful depiction of its characters to embody different facets of being human. “Ex Machina’s” events unfold chronologically over the week-long experiment. Barrow and Salisbury’s score perfectly deceives the audience into believing in Ava’s innocence and trustworthiness until the melody climaxes into a dark final track, reflecting her eventual betrayal and her true nature.

At the beginning of the film, the music tends to fade into the background. Dialogue overpowers  the audio track in most of the scenes, and any contributions made by music before Ava’s entrance are very subtle. The only exception to this is the scene in which Nathan watches Caleb explore the house, in which the music attempts to paint Nathan as a villainous character through its ominous mood.

When Caleb first sees Ava, the music that pervades the scene has a very simple and childlike melody consisting of nursery rhyme-like chimes with minimal extraneous background elements. The mood of Ava’s theme is almost fairytale-like, and it perfectly captures and quietly instills a sense of Ava’s purity into the minds of the audience. As the film progresses, the music becomes increasingly more melodic, utilizes more background elements, and relies more heavily on electronic instruments rather than just the simple chimes of Ava’s theme.

In the final scenes of the film, the audience finally learns what appears to be Ava’s true nature. She and fellow android Kyoko kill Nathan, and during this climatic sequence, the music is extremely loud and entirely electronic. Even though we see Nathan get stabbed, he never screams, and the only audible dialogue is a few words under his breath. When Ava puts on the skin of the other robots, making herself appear entirely human, and eventually leaves Caleb behind, the music once again becomes simplistic. It eerily elicits the same feeling of childhood innocence as is presented upon the audience’s first encounter with Ava. This circular usage of Ava’s theme forces viewers to re-evaluate our interpretation of whether or not Ava is necessarily human and question the definition of the concept itself.

The score of “Ex Machina” functions as a key device in contributing to the deceit of the audience while also foreshadowing the final decisions and true personalities of the film’s characters. By attempting to paint Nathan as the clear villain and Ava as the clear damsel in distress, the score is much more effectively able to shock the audience when the film’s events unfurl and reveal Ava’s clever deception.