Noted science fiction author Brian Aldiss wrote his short story, "Super-Toys Last All Summer Long," over 30 years ago. Published in Harper?s Bazaar in 1969 and later anthologized, it concerned a near future in which a robot child struggles to make a connection with his human mother.

After more than a decade, director Stanley Kubrick purchased the rights to Aldiss?s tale and set out on what would become a twenty-year odyssey to convert it into "A.I." Throughout this period, Kubrick consulted often with Steven Spielberg, who had commenced a friendship with the expatriate filmmaker in 1979 while Spielberg was on location in England shooting "Raiders of the Lost Ark." Their nearly 20-year friendship involved few face-to-face meetings, but thrived on marathon transatlantic phone calls.

"A lot of our phone calls through the years were just to make contact with each other, to see what was happening on both sides of the ocean," Spielberg recalls. "I saw him maybe 12 times over two decades. But one day in the middle of a conversation, he said ?You know, you really ought to direct ?A.I.? and I should produce it for you.? I remember him actually giving me a title card on the whole proposal: a Stanley Kubrick production of a Steven Spielberg film."

Taken aback, Spielberg asked why Kubrick would consider passing the reins of a long favored project to him. "I was shocked. I said, ?Why would you want to do that, Stanley?? He just said ?Well, you know, I think this movie is closer to your sensibility than mine.?"

Executive producer Jan Harlan had worked with his brother-in-law Stanley Kubrick for thirty years, shepherding many projects with him since "Barry Lyndon," including "Super-Toys Last All Summer Long." "Stanley always wanted to go to new territory," says Harlan. "Always probing. He wanted to bring the art of moviemaking into areas and topics that hadn?t been explored. ?2001? is a great example. So is ?Eyes Wide Shut? - it tackled a very internal topic: Jealousy. ?Every single member of the audience is bound to be an expert,? Stanley once said. He had planned to do ?A.I.? before ?Eyes Wide Shut,? but many factors delayed this."

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