AfrAId review – throwaway AI-themed horror devoid of suspense

A sinister Alexa upgrade exerts control on family in an increasingly nonsensical attempt to capture the moment

Given how technology has become the increasingly unstoppable architect of our everyday lives - the world edging closer and closer to a Terminator prequel - it's not hard to immediately invest in a horror film about the all-consuming threat of artificial intelligence. The film industry itself has been losing ground as AI continues to provide a cheaper and easier alternative to those pesky humans and in a year of bleak headline after bleak headline, it should theoretically be perfect timing for Blumhouse's late August M3gan-adjacent chiller AfrAId. Yet, as one might be able to predict without the help of a digital forecast, easy targets are easily missed in a hokey and rushed jumble of half-ideas that's as gimmicky and eye-rollingly stupid as its title. Be afraid.

In the dog days of summer, on a particularly rubbishy Labor Day weekend at the movies (other new releases include long-delayed sci-fi thriller Slingshot and a reverential biopic of Reagan), it's at least reassuring to know that very few people will find themselves stuck with this one (it's tracking to make between $5m and $7m). Sony, clearly scared of scaring off those precious few, decided not to provide a single press screening, aware of the critical drubbing this would receive. It's not quite as unreleasably awful as that strategy might suggest - it's competently, at times handsomely, shot, refreshingly dour and crucially not as awful as The Crow - but it's too sloppily written and edited for even the least discerning of horror fans to really enjoy, a patchwork of nonsense confusingly stitched together by someone, who at one point, knew better.