Let me start off by saying that I was a fan of the first two Robocop movies as a kid, and grew up hating the 3rd, and never got into the comics or the cartoons. But I always liked the first two movies, and in due time I expected someone to remake the series or bring it back some how. Its a very cool storyline which can easily be translated to what we are facing today with invasion of privacy, and the potential of us losing some of the freedoms we have due to political unrest. Robocop much like the Terminator series, and even the Matrix trilogy reminds us that our evolution as human beings could easily be in danger if we arent careful with our own creations. While we like to think we are very smart, and we like to play god sometimes it begs the question when have we gone too far? The film takes place in the year 2028 so its not that far fetched to think that this could happen one day soon when we look at how advanced computers are today. We are not looking at something that far off in the future here at all. Now this remake has managed to anger a lot of fanboys online from day one people complained, and nit picked at little things which made no sense really. Most complained because they said the movie having a black suit looked too much like something out of BATMAN. Ironically enough Michael Keaton is in the movie, and he played Batman. Keaton plays Raymond Sellars the CEO of OmniCorp or OCP for short. Yes they kept OCP as the company name. When multinational conglomerate OmniCorp who is at the center of robot technology, and is in charge of taking care of our global wars using their robots overseas, their drones have been used by the military for years - and its meant billions for OmniCorps bottom line. Now OmniCorp wants to bring their controversial technology to the home front, and they see a golden opportunity to do it. When Alex Murphy (Joel Kinnaman) - a loving husband, father and good cop doing his best to stem the tide of crime and corruption in Detroit - is critically injured in the line of duty, OmniCorp sees their chance for a part-man, part-robot police officer. OmniCorp envisions a RoboCop in every city and even more billions for their shareholders, but they never counted on one thing: there is still a man inside the machine pursuing justice. The movie has one of the best cast Ive seen put together for a remake ever. Besides Michael Keaton, and Joel Kinnaman the film also has fellow Batman alumni Gary Oldman as Dr. Dennett Norton the Frankenstein of the movie. Hes the man behind the machine, and the real brains behind OCP. Jackie Earle Haley as Rick Mattox the man whos in charge of training Robocop, and eventually has to try, and stop him. Jay Baruchel as Tom Pope whos fresh of his big hit film This is the END he plays one of the marketing geniuses at OCP whos trying to figure out the best way to sell a Robocop to the people. Abbie Cornish as Clara Murphy is a bit under used in the film but its not shocking when they have so much story to tell. Either way she was excellent in her performance, and what I loved the most about this movie is the strong bond between the Murphy family, and that is evident by the good chemistry that Joel & Abbie had on screen. The movie also has Sam Jackson in a political tv show type who only comes out in scenes promoting the OCP agenda. Dont want to give too much away but hes a scene stealer, and at the very start of the movie he does just that. But its not shocking Sam Jackson always steals the scenes hes in. Hes that great of an actor. Michael Keaton also does a fantastic job here looking sympathetic one minute, and evil the next. He steals a bunch of scenes here also, and gave a great performance. There is one scene when Dr. Dennett Norton shows Murphy what is actually left of his body, and he takes him apart. This is a very powerful scene, and acted very well by both men. Remember Murphy loses his limbs, and all thats left here after they put him in the suit is his head, a hand, and lungs. People ask why would they keep one of his hands? Well I think its to allow him to have feel when he touches something. But that isnt really addressed in the movie. But I think its a way to allow him to keep a little piece of his humanity. Honestly overall everyone was great in this movie, and even tho fanboys also complained about the PG-13 rating this movie has a bigger body count, and more action then the original. So reason why Murphy gets to become the chosen one for Robocop is a bit under developed but its tied up very well at the end. IF there isnt a sequel to this movie its tied up well enough that it would work as a stand alone movie. But I do hope to see a sequel to it. I really think it deserved better, and the fans who have hated on it for no other reason other than to hate because its not exactly how the original was I say this. You want something thats a shot for shot remake? Look at Psycho, and how that turned out. They have a lot of nods to the original movie here we even get a nice reference to Id buy that for a dollar! I think people just have a problem sometimes letting go, and they cant accept updates to classic movies. But if you go into this movie with an open mind, and are willing to give it a fair chance you will be surprised about how good it actually is. José Padilha is a great up, and coming film maker, and sadly the studio was a bit hard for him to work with, and while this movie is really good had he been given full creative control we could have had a masterpiece. That this isnt but honestly its a worthy remake to a classic, and its a movie that deserves a better fate than it looks like its going to get, and which at times is actually a better film then the original. The human element works much better here then it ever did in the original. 4.5 out of 5 https://youtube/watch?v=INmtQXUXez8 imdb/title/tt1234721/combined
Posted on: Sat, 22 Feb 2014 05:21:30 +0000