Arrival Amy Adams stars in this elegant, involving science fiction drama that is simultaneously old and new, revisiting many alien invasion conventions but with unexpected intelligence, visual style and heart. Certain Women Laura Dern, Michelle Williams, Kristen Stewart and a revelatory Lily Gladstone star in writer-director Kelly Reichardt's beautifully understated triptych about four women making their way through life in small-town Montana. The Eagle Huntress A portrait of a 13-year-old Kazakh girl from Mongolia who defies eons of tradition by learning to hunt with fierce golden eagles is a documentary so satisfying it makes you feel good about feeling good. The Handmaiden The most absorbing feature in years from the South Korean director Park Chan-wook ("Oldboy") is a teasingly witty and elegant puzzle-box of a thriller about two women (played by Kim Tae-ri and Kim Min-hee) pursuing their destinies in 1930s Japanese-occupied Korea. Kubo and the Two Strings In this 3-D wonderment steeped in ancient Japanese folklore and brought to life by the stop-motion innovators at Laika Entertainment, magic is both an eye-popping phenomenon and an everyday reality.

Many rural Ugandans don't have Internet access, and the radio is a central source of news -- and platform for citizens' opinions. Many rural Ugandans don't have Internet access, and the radio is a central source of news -- and platform for citizens' opinions. The inspiration for the tool came from projects that use social media to identify citizens' concerns -- for instance, what concerns people have about an immunization drive, or how often they suffer power outages. But at the Global Pulse lab in Kampala, Uganda, social media analysis wouldn't work, says lab manager Paula Hidalgo-Sanchis -- especially if the U.N. wanted to listen to rural voices.

Stomping and roaring dinosaurs took to the stage in Tokyo on Thursday as part of a presentation for a proposed entertainment park where visitors will be able to see the realistic replicas first-hand. Japanese firm ON-ART Corp. unveiled man-operated robotic models of raptors, an allosaurus and a tyrannosaurus rex, in a performance at a hotel hall. At one point, the t-rex even appeared to bite the head of a pretend caretaker. Around 8 meters (26 ft) high, the dinosaur replicas were modeled from fossilized skeletons and made of carbon fiber materials, according to the company. Reminiscent of the theme park seen in Steven Spielberg's blockbuster "Jurassic Park" film, ON-ART Corp. CEO Kazuya Kanemaru said he wanted to create a "DINO-A-PARK" where dinosaur fans could experience the creatures first-hand.

Movies that begin with confounding aliens on the loose have been around for awhile (at least since 1951's "Man From Planet X" and "The Day the Earth Stood Still") and they invariably share a family resemblance even if the space visitors themselves never look the same way twice. Where do these beings come from, baffled scientists and frightened government officials inevitably want to know. Are they friendly or hostile, what do they want from us and what are they doing here in the first place? One of the most satisfying things about Denis Villeneuve's elegant, involving "Arrival" is that it is simultaneously old and new, revisiting many of these alien-invasion conventions but with unexpected intelligence, visual style and heart. Working from a smart and effective script by Eric Heisserer adapted from a cerebral short story by science-fiction luminary Ted Chiang, the French-Canadian director and his team have found ways to make these way-out-of-the-ordinary events seem plausible and convincing.

More chatbots will begin to solve real-world problems. In many instances, early chatbots seemed more like technologies in search of problems than customer-centric solutions. As the chatbot hype subsides, technologies mature, and companies get feedback from customers, the problems that chatbots tackle will become more obvious, and, in turn, more valuable. An example is our own ReplyYes' The Edit, which endeavors to solve the problem of product discovery for music lovers. Through a use of progressive disclosure, short keyword interactions, and machine-based curation of vinyl albums, we give customers a personalized and serendipitous experience to help them find music they love.

Recently, I needed to book a lunch meeting. To help coordinate, I asked Amy to assist and cc'd her on the email. "Amy," I wrote, "please help us find a time to meet. Let's plan for sushi at Tokyo Express on Spear Street." Amy looked at my calendar, found an open time suitable for everyone invited, and booked the meeting.

In our recent article about artificially intelligent (AI) robot writers, we talked about how media content is starting to be automatically generated using scripted methods that let you produce lots of content very easily. Here at Nanalyze, we love to write about technology in a way that is relevant to investors, straight forward, and doesn't pander to anyone. We typically don't cite authors on our articles because we believe the message is more important than the messenger (don't shoot the messenger and all that). We also believe that someday in our lifetimes, the occupation of being a "writer" is going the way of the dodo because artificial intelligence (AI) will do a better job than human authors. At that point, you could either make up fake names for your authors or what will most likely happen is we'll have different AI sages that are watched over by a human editor but that publish under a single brand name.

Killer computers, robot uprisings: Hollywood has long had a deep fascination for artificial intelligence. Even off screen, AI is increasingly a key part of the media business -- but thus far, the reality isn't nearly as dramatic as movies like "Her" or "Ex Machina" make it out to be. This story first appeared in the November 08, 2016 issue of Variety. Case in point: You've probably been contacted by AI today without even knowing it. That push notification on your mobile phone, the email newsletter of your favorite website, or the videos recommended to you while binge-watching are being powered by machine-learning algorithms that rely on huge amounts of data to make smart decisions about the media you'd be inclined to consume.

There's huge interest in artificial intelligence these days and countless investors seeking to get their fingers on the AI investment pie. But while AI is hot today, the advent of super-intelligent, self-directed computers is really still years away. However, there's a tremendous amount of things that "can already be achieved with machinery today," says the Harvard Business Review. "And that's where forward-thinking managers should be focusing." Machine learning is the sub-field of computer science that "gives computers the ability to learn without being explicitly programmed."

Many predict artificial intelligence (AI) will someday cure cancer, clean up our environment, drastically improve our cities, and send us to Mars, among a host of other accomplishments. However, with the potential benefits that inspire oohs and aahs also comes risk. Before there was Siri, there was HAL. And in the epic science fiction movie "2001: A Space Odyssey," when the poor astronaut Dave Bowman asks the supercomputer HAL 9000 to let him back inside the spacecraft, HAL merely responds, "I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that." Granted, this was a movie--albeit a brilliant one--but there are still real life concerns about what exactly are artificial intelligence best practices and a need for guidelines.