It is a time when natural resources are limited and technology is advancing at an astronomical pace. Where you live is monitored; what you eat is engineered; and the person serving you is not a person at all. It’s artificial. Gardening, housekeeping, companionship -- there is a robot for every need. Except love.
Emotion is the last, controversial frontier in robot evolution. Robots are seen as sophisticated appliances; they’re not supposed to have feelings. But with so many parents not yet approved to have children, the possibilities abound. And Cybertronics Manufacturing has created the solution. His name is David (Haley Joel Osment).
A robotic boy, the first programmed to love, David is adopted as a test case by a Cybertronics employee and his wife, whose own terminally ill child has been cryogenically frozen until a cure can be found. Though he gradually becomes their child, with all the love and stewardship that entails, a series of unexpected circumstances make this life impossible for David.
Without final acceptance by humans or machines, and armed only with Teddy, his supertoy teddy bear and protector, David embarks on a journey to discover where he truly belongs, uncovering a world in which the line between robot and machine is both terrifyingly vast and profoundly thin.