Robots

I like Shailene Woodley although she's not renowned for comedy. Jack Whitehall I can take or leave. He's not really that funny. But I love SciFi so I decided to give it a try.

The idea is great. Charles has a robot (C2) which is a mirror image of himself which he uses to work and earn a wage, and take women out on dates until they are ready to have sex, then he takes over.

Elaine also has a mirror image robot (E2) which she allows to date and sleep with men in order to get money and expensive gifts from them without her having to sleep with them.

One night C2 meets E2 and they fall in love and run off together framing Charles and Elaine in a crime, knowing they will be caught having mirror image robots which is illegal.

Still with me?

Onwards to some really silly but funny humour. Whitehall and Woodley actually do have a bit of chemistry together but it's not your usual formulaic romance and there are no gratuitous sex scenes. It's all just silly, plain fun and although Whitehall is a professional comedian, he doesn't take advantage of that in the film and sticks to his character.

I really enjoyed it.

When I saw Robert Sheckley's name in the credits, I knew right away what I was in for. And that's the best thing about Robots: it's the best cinematic rendition so far of Sheckley's unique mix of SF and satire.

To be sure, that mix may not be to everyone's taste. The main reason is likely to be historical. The story The Robot Who Looked Like Me, upon which the movie Robots is based, dates back to 1978, and is bound to show its age a bit. On the other hand, the basic concept remains fresh and amusing: robot stand-ins being used for devious purposes, thereby bringing out the worst in weak personalities.

The execution isn't perfect. Some gags are side-splitting, others barely worth a giggle. The relationship between the two leads follows an obvious but not entirely believable trajectory. And yet, the movie overall achieves what it sets out to do. It's both funny and thought-provoking, suggesting ways of thinking about 'AI' that may not have occurred to us even as the technology is being deployed around us.

The acting is solid. Shailene Woodley and British comedian Jack Whitehall both do a good job in their double roles - triple, in the case of Woodley). Their 'real' personalities are suitably loathsome and venal. The robot personalities are convincingly genteel and obsequious. And Woodley's bit as a sex-toy version of herself is hilarious.

But what I liked most was that old lunatic feel of Sheckley's writing. He's not the best-remembered author of the SF golden age, perhaps because he took a very different approach. I haven't pulled any of his books off my shelf for many years, but certain passages, certain zany situations, still ring in my mind. It's great to see this kind of material rediscovered and respectfully adapted. I wish Hollywood would get busy adapting more SF classics works for 21st-Century audiences.

(FYI: previous Sheckley adaptations have included The Tenth Victim - La Decima VIttima, starring Marcello Mastroianni and Ursula Andress, and Freejack, starring Mick Jagger. Not great films, but stylish fun.)

It has several laugh out loud moments, like the Tesla robot immigrants line at the start which misleadingly raised my expectations really high. I was a little excited before hand, didn't know the story or expecting it to be amazing, all I knew was Jack Whitehall in a movie with Shailene Woodley; which are two people I never thought would star in a movie together as romantic lead. And from that point it's exactly how you'd expect it to go. Don't expect anything special. I am a huge fan of Shailene in pretty much everything I've seen her in, and I've watched some of Jack's standup and liked him in jungle cruise.

It was just really cringe for the most part, and as much as I like Jack his role felt miscast, he started off as a player which wasn't believable even if you hadn't seen him in anything else; but as the movie went on he broke character and instead of acting as Charles, glimpses of the Jack's personality in real life broke through. Shailene was great and feels like her talents went wasted.

It had a really low budget and it was very evident throughout; which is fine sometimes but is noticeable when the movie isn't great to begin with. Robots look scary and creepy, the slave ones not the clones. It was a pretty good premise but definitely could've been executed better and it would've covered up the cracks. It also feels much shorter than it actually is, which I think is a positive, rather that than the movie feel drag out.

The characters lacked chemistry and in such a movie that would've been invaluable. It's the type of movie that needs spectacular chemistry or writing in order to pull off, otherwise it flops. I couldn't hate it though because I'm a fan of the actors but in the end, it should've been more romantic and more comedic, so that doesn't bode well for any romcom.

After watching the trailer I expected to like this movie and it turned out to be pretty much exactly what I expected it to be. It's a straightforward story with plenty of laughs. The jokes mostly landed for me, even the silly ones, but that's going to vary from person to person. People are always so hard on comedies but I would take a bad comedy over a good drama most days. But I don't think this is a bad comedy, at worst it's average.

It's foremost a romance, so anyone not looking for a rom-com is watching the wrong movie. But it's a nice alternative to the Hallmark romances churned out by the dozen. Rom-coms involving a begrudging alliance between two people ill-suited to be together who eventually fall in love is one of my favorite tropes. It reminded me of Addicted to Love.

What we have here seems like a silly sci-fi romcom, it even works as such. But upon closer inspection you'll realize most of the jokes are aimed not at the characters on screen but rather at us, the viewers. The characters themselves are well written and well performed cartoons with single characteristic driving each of them, not with a fully developed character, they should have if they're to pass as relatable humans. Which means - what we're watching is in-fact a satire not a romcom. But since satire is often confused with comedy and comedy does sell better, it does make sense to disguise it as a silly rom-com.

Do have a closer look, you'll see the point is our never-ending quest for leisurely carefree living with as little regard as possible to anyone but us. So what would happen if we did get robots to do all our dirty jobs. What if we could build them to look exactly like us. Yes that would be illegal but when did the law stop anyone with enough money from breaching it. So this "what's if", is the starting point of this very clever movie. I won't tell you any more on the plot. Ill only mention the single major fault of this movie - a forced ending meant to suite its rom-com disguise. I'd rate it much higher without this forced end. Still, it's a fun clever movie worth your time.