As if the future of AI wasn’t already nightmarish enough, along comes this British sci-fi thriller with its storyline about an AI servant becoming dangerously infatuated with his female owner. It’s a creepy premise: a cross between Fatal Attraction and The Servant, Harold Pinter and Joseph Losey’s 1963 drama about a malevolent manservant. Though in the end TIM might be too silly to be scary and yet not sharp enough to work as satire.
Part of the problem is the AI itself, a humanoid robot inoffensively named TIM (short for “technologically integrated manservant”), played by Eamon Farren. There’s no question of keeping us guessing about his intentions: TIM is sinister from the get-go. With his slicked-down blond hair and penetrating blue-eye stare, he looks like a spoof of a Nazi youth leader with a flash of Hannibal Lecter.
TIM is actually a prototype manservant being tested at home by robotics engineer Abi (Georgina Campbell). She’s unfazed by her new robo-housekeeper; for her “he” is an “it” – a useful bit of time-saving kit, like a smartphone or washing machine. Her husband Paul (Mark Rowley) is less keen, and he doesn’t like the way TIM looks at Abi.
Of course, poor dumb human Paul is no match for TIM as he makes himself indispensable around the house. He cooks like a pro, irons like a dream – and also gains access to Abi and Paul’s personal data, which makes for some icky moments before he goes properly scary. One afternoon TIM returns from an upgrade having transformed himself into a brunette after noticing that Abi lingers for 0.4 seconds longer on images of men with dark hair.
Of course, a film about the perils of AI couldn’t be more timely. Still I watched wishing for the Black Mirror version; you would think Charlie Brooker would have done something blackly funny, more profound with a bunny-boiling bot.
• TIM is released on 16 August on Netflix.
