RoboCop

Up front I'll confess. I'm one of those curmudgeony dinosaurs who takes it as a personal affront to my long gone adolescence whenever anyone dares to remake an 80s flick. I mean, heck, movies aside, NOTHING can compare to how stylin' I was in my parachute pants & moussed up hair as I strutted in that movie theater with my gallon of Fresca, pop rocks & Fruit Stripe gum back in '87 to watch the cinematic event of the decade, Robocop. That alone, plus the fact that they don't make gum with real sugar anymore (communists!), makes me want to thumbs-down every remake of today.

But you know what? This movie sorta rocks. I'll tell you why.

First of all, the story is COMPLETELY different, so it can't even be considered a remake. I'm a firm believer that, much like Jimi Hendrix did when he covered "Hey Joe", if you're going to revisit someone else's work then do it completely differently. That's what the director did here. Only the basic premise remains: a lone, half-computerized "Everyman" decides to take on a criminal/corporate colossus while simultaneously struggling with his lost humanity.

First off, Robocop 2014 is a much broader, more family-friendly film. Gone is the extreme, in-your-face violence and criminal depravity that worked so well in the original which was intended to disturb viewers on an emotional level (Veerhoven is king of cinematic satire). Whereas the old Robocop was known to pump lead into perpetrators' private parts, in this version Robocop uses a taser gun to take down most threats. Granted, it's a taser gun that packs enough juice to take down the jolly green giant, but the point is we don't see quite as much blood & guts.

Instead of disturbing violence and hard-hitting satire, we get some very interesting political and philosophical spins. The idea of a robot police force is cleverly tied in with military drones and smart-warfare technology that's already in use today. The question being posed is: when we turn this same technology on ourselves (America) to police our own people, suddenly it seems bone-chillingly sick.

Another new & interesting spin is the idea that Robocop is the personification of the existentialist debate. Do we have free will? Or is there some governing force that has written out our lives and "choices" already, and we are merely as Shakespeare said, a bunch of actors playing out roles? Robocop 2014 touches on this with the idea that Robo is actually hard-coded to behave as a machine with only the illusion that he has conscious will. THAT was a great philosophical angle which I actually wish the movie had spent another hour exploring. But I guess that would've taxed a lot of viewers' attention spans, so it was kept under the surface. Still it's something to ponder heavily as the movie unfolds.

Special effects, action, costumes & gizmos are eye poppingly great. And I don't mean over-the-top cartoonish, either. They're great because the film does a nice job of keeping things real enough to make you think this scenario could actually happen. In the "Behind the scenes" bonus, a point is brought up that the director nixed a bunch of really cool scifi ideas (such as a motorcycle that transforms into a shell around Robo) because he didn't want the viewer to get lost in too much fantasy. The result is more of a straightforward crime drama or even political thriller than it is scifi.

The acting. OK, for real, how can anyone fail with Michael Keaton (the first movie Batman) and Gary Oldman (Dracula) and, in a peripheral but awesomely hilarious parody role Samuel L Jackson (Pulp Fiction!) as the rabid fascist foul-mouthed host of a cable "news" show called The Novak Element. Oh gawd, fans of Veerhoven's satirical skewerings will LOVE this character. Relative newcomer Joel Kinnaman (Robo) does a great job, and old Robocop fans might notice some deliberate homages he makes to the original Peter Weller performance such as the way he always turns with his head first, then shoulders, then feet.

I also must add a quick note about the music used in this film. There are several great homages to us aging fans with selections such as The Clash "I Fought the Law" and a great shoot-em-up scene that uses "Hocus Pocus" by Focus. And I think that approach sums up what this film is all about. It's not attempting to trample on our memories of the original Robocop, but rather, it acknowledges old fans while presenting something completely different and, in my opinion, worthwhile. Now if someone would only acknowledge my cool parachute pants I be flying high.

Yes, they've gone and remade another classic. Whether you loved or hated the original Robocop movie in the eighties (and, let's face it... most of us loved it!), you'll find it difficult to deny that it was popular. And one of its major traits was how deliciously over-the-top violent it was. It contained numerous scenes of graphic violence and interlinked them with (no so subtle) social commentary, making it a sheer delight to watch (assuming your cup of tea was watching an indestructible cyborg brutally wiping out scores of scum-bags).

Now, twenty-five years later, it gets rebooted (not including the pretty poor showings which made up Robocop's sequels and TV spin-off show). And, the first thing you need to know, is that it's no longer an 'adult' movie. Due to the film-makers wanting to claw back as much of its budget as they could, they've gone and made it a PG-13/12 certificate. So, what we're left with is the cyborg-action equivalent of World War Z (a mainstream big budget zombie film with no violence or gore).

This is the major 'flaw' in the film (which most people seem to dwell on). It's fair to say that this reboot hasn't performed as well as the producers would have liked it to (I'll bet they were hoping this would be the springboard to launch a lucrative franchise off of). However, if you get over the die-hard fans and their shouts of disapproval because no one gets melted in a vat of toxic waste, you may actually enjoy it.

Yes, the action is greatly reduced, but what's there is still pretty cool. Plus the cast is excellent and what it lacks in fight scenes it makes up for in commentary on today's modern way of life and how much computers (and in this case robots) intrude and may well intrude with our day to day existence.

If you ask me which Robocop is better (1987 vs 2014) I would say the original, but simply because it was just that – the original. Plus I have never ending nostalgia for one of my favourite childhood movies. However, if you can put any bias you have to the back of your mind and look at this one as a completely fresh tale which simply borrows major plot points and situations from its source material, then you may just find an enjoyable movie in there somewhere.

Thank you for your cooperation.

http://thewrongtreemoviereviews.blogspot.co.uk/

I really don't understand all the hate this movie gets. Yeah, I get it, it's a reboot of a perfectly good 80s movie that nobody really wanted, but it's a really good one! I expected a mindless Micheal Bayian action movie and what I got was a really smart, interesting and entertaining look at trans-humanism, the freedom of choice, politics and recklessness in corporate leaders.

This movie really dives into the question of how a person could live his day to day live with almost all of his body amputated and stuck inside of a machine. So when people complain about the uncomfortable scenes between Murphy and his wife, I can only imagine they mean what happened after his transformation, and that felt exactly the way it was supposed to!

So yes, the original is way more graphic and still holds up to this day as a gruesome action flick, but this one is smart and interesting and really is a good movie in it's own right.

And by no means is it as bad as people say it is!

I am always wary of remakes of classic films but at the same time try and keep a clear mind in that just one day they might get it right.

I question if this is actually remake of Robocop or a new film with Robocop as our lead. Are there comparisons, well there is Murphy (Robocop) , Lewis (now male) and the bad guy. The role of the owner of the business is much different to that of the original.

The storyline is excellent and the transformation of Murphy to Robocop is explored much more deeply than in the original, however (and this is not a spoiler) you can guess which bit will be included in the conclusion. The emotional transformations are excellent as Robocop evolves . The scenes where the action kick in have kept the violence levels down compared to the original , which still has one of the best scenes ever with our melting man, but I still think this film has been lucky to achieve a 12a .

A good watch , is it better than the original said my 12 year old ? Genuinely I don't know , the original is great as it set the benchmark, this new version has more modern special effects and the telling of the story is better.

Whatever watch this.

I love Paul Verhoeven's RoboCop from 1987 (which remains iconic) and I usually don't like reboots. But watching the new one I never got rid of the feeling, that the remake is worth it. It is a whole new interpretation, that sets the focus on the topics of our time: robots, drones, the human aspect behind the technology, media critics, war propaganda. I felt, the movie has a mission to enlighten people and I liked that. It became even more obvious how much the RoboCop story exists within the topos of Frankenstein which is the story about the human devilment and the lack of respect of life. That's why Padilha gives Murphy more of a face, a life and feelings.

Beside that the pictures, the sound, the music is pretty contemporary. You probably have to make some compromises today to get the millions to get the flick done. It won't become iconic, but it's the right time for the right message in the right movie.