An android robot named Geminoid F is co-star in the Japanese film "Sayonara" shown at the 2015 Tokyo International Film Festival. She even appeared on the red carpet, but was in a wheelchair because the android does not walk independently.
The Telegraph reports that Geminoid F's role in the science-fiction drama is that of Leona, one of two survivors of a nuclear disaster. Her co-star is 27-year-old human actress Bryerly Long, who portrays Tania, and is dying of radiation.
Leona is wheelchair-bound in the movie because of a faulty knee joint. She has no understanding of dying which is what Tania is going through.
The film, directed by Koji Fukada, was adapted from a short play by Oriza Hirata with the same title. The play has been performed in Europe, the U.S. and Canada since it premiered in Japan in 2010 where Geminoid was also the actress.
The British daily notes that when viewing the movie, it would take film watchers a few seconds before they realize that Leona is not human. It describes the android's movement as "deliciously eerie" from the way she blinks to her talking and even adjusting her eye line to look directly at people.
Professor Hiroshi Ishiguro, the creator of Geminoid F, controls her movements from a laptop. She is one of the androids he has created at the Osaka University's Intelligent Robotics Laboratory. Ishiguro's first creation was Geminoid HI-2. He uses 12 pneumatic actuators underneath the android's silicone skin to control Geminoid's facial expressions.
Daily Mail reports that Ishiguro cost him $111,000, which has gone down since his androids initially cost $1.2 million.
After "Sayonara" was screened in Tokyo, the professor says Geminoid F is proof that "androids can express as much as humanity as human actors." Its regular showing in Japan begins on Nov. 21, but there are no dates yet for overseas screening.