Beneath its AI premise, Klara and the Sun wrestles with worship, perfection and what it means to be human. This imperfect adaption of Kazuo Ishiguro’s novel reveals a universal longing for the love of a saviour that technology cannot fulfill, says Holly Price
There is something artificial about Taika Waititi’s adaptation of Klara and the Sun – even though it’s not really about Artificial Intelligence. It explores genuine human longings but slaps an overly bright smile on them, losing something of the story’s soul in the process.
As a book group, we loved the haunting depth of Kazuo Ishiguro’s novel, so we were intrigued to see Waititi’s quirkier take. Yet where the book’s restraint proved devastating, the film’s sentimentality felt manufactured.
Our deepest longing is not for healing, certainty or control, but for the God who made us
Klara and the Sun becomes an unintended parable for our age. Faced with a novel that invites patient reflection on love, devotion and personhood, the adaptation opts for something shinier, simpler and easier to consume. Perhaps that disconnect raises the story’s deepest question: What are we really looking for?
Praying to the sun
Ironically, the film feels most human when it focuses on its least human character.
Jenna Ortega is compelling as Klara, an Artificial Friend (AF) made ‘special’ by her glitches: standing like a flamingo, tilting her head in birdlike curiosity, and overextending facial muscles long underused as Wednesday Addams.
Klara tries hard to obey her store manager’s rule, “Don’t do weird things”, but she keeps praying to the sun. As a solar-powered AF, she depends on its light for energy, but it also fills her with hope.
Her childlike praise, petitions and thanksgiving are reminiscent of Paul’s instruction to “Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances” (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18). In a world of sick children, anxious parents and broken relationships, everyone is searching for something strong enough to bear the weight of their hopes.
However, as an audience, we know that Klara’s prayers need recalibrating. The sun is not listening. Devotion is powerful, but it cannot transform a created thing into a saviour.
As Paul reminds us: “For from [God] and through Him and for Him are all things” (Romans 11:36). If we squint a little, Klara’s faith points beyond itself: our deepest longing is not for healing, certainty or control, but for the God who made us.
The price of perfection
But Klara isn’t the only character looking for hope in the wrong place. In this world, perfection has become a god. Genetic enhancement (‘lifting’) promises a better future for some, while AFs fill the relational gaps left behind.
Josie, like most young people, shops for an AF she will shape in her image: a walking, talking, mostly listening echo chamber. Klara knows her purpose: “to accompany Josie during her lonely, dorky years”; a description that reveals just how disconnected this supposedly advanced society has become.
Devotion is powerful, but it cannot transform a created thing into a saviour
‘Lifted’ children become geniuses overnight yet seem to have lost the art of connection. The screenplay pushes a particular refrain: “What is the point?”
Josie’s painfully awkward ‘interaction meeting’ reveals what has been sacrificed on the altar of getting ahead. Her mother, Chrissy, asks: “What good is perfection? What is it for?”
Ishiguro is asking not only what makes us human, but what makes life meaningful. Beneath the pursuit of perfection lies a refusal to accept brokenness. Characters search for ways to outmanoeuvre the limits of their humanity. Yet if our value lies in achievement, usefulness or perfection, then we are never more than a better version away from becoming obsolete.
Love in person
What makes humans irreplaceable? What redeems our faults and our desperate attempts to overcome them? Klara and the Sun suggests that the answer lies not in perfection but in love.
Klara’s greatest strength is not her intelligence but her attentiveness. She notices, watches and waits. In many ways, she models the kind of self-giving posture described in Romans 12. Yet Christ offers something far more extraordinary: the love of a God who listens, speaks and acts.
Paul’s challenge is simple: “Love from the centre of who you are; don’t fake it” (Romans 12:9 MSG). For all its flaws, Klara and the Sun exposes how difficult that really is. Its characters pursue love as something to secure, measure and protect, yet remain profoundly lonely. They settle for artificial companions instead of friendship, enhancement instead of acceptance, control instead of trust.
Later, Paul warns us not to become so “absorbed and exhausted in taking care of all [our] day-by-day obligations” (Romans 13:11 MSG) that we lose sight of what God is doing. Perhaps that is why Klara remains such a compelling character. While everyone around her is striving for the next upgrade, Klara pauses and pays attention.
The Christian life is not an invitation to a more convincing performance of hope, purpose or love. It is an invitation into the reality of life with Christ: to wake up to what is true, trust the God who made us and learn to love from the centre of who we are.
In a world crowded with substitutes, perhaps the challenge of Klara and the Sun is this: Where have we settled for something artificial when Christ is offering us the real thing?
Klara and the Sun is in UK cinemas now
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