The film depicts a humanoid robot programmed to do what ‘Daddy’ wants (YouTube/Berlinale)

The director of a controversial film set to be screened at the Berlin Film Festival has admitted she expects audience members to walk out.

The film in question, The Trouble With Being Born, centers on a humanoid robot resembling a 10-year-old child and its relationship with a middle-aged man that it calls ‘Daddy’.

Although, some of the more troubling ideas behind this relationship aren’t explicitly shown, it is definitely implied. And the envelope-pushing nature of the subject may not be for everyone.

In fact, Austrian director Sandra Wollner revealed that some viewers at a prefestival test screening decided to leave the theatre.




‘But with my last film [The Impossible Picture] a lot of people walked out as well,’ she told The Hollywood Reporter.

‘I mean, we were very lucky and it was quite successful. But still, people walked out, so I cannot imagine it’s not going to happen now.’

The android is called Elli (YouTube/Berlinale)

Wollner described The Trouble With Being Born as the ‘antithesis to Pinocchio‘ in that instead of a fake child dreaming about being human, you have a robotic child that is simply a result of programming.

‘What I found interesting about it is that we have an android whose only desires are the ones you program it to have,’ she said. ‘I found it fascinating to show the perspective of the world through this machine that does not judge and does not care, and doesn’t need the meanings that we do.’

The divide between humans and androids is narrowing. Perhaps the most famous is Sophia – a robot capable of showing 50 different facial expressions and using voice recognition originally developed by Google to pick up and answer questions.

The robot has made appearances all over the world and has become a bit of a standard bearer for humanoid androids.