The Unseen Movie Review

I, Robot

The movie is based on the classic Isaac Asimov short story collection of the same name that centred on his famous three laws of robotics, which have since been adopted by the real world robotics industry. These laws state that: 1) A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm; 2) A robot must obey orders given to it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law; 3) A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law. Considering these laws cannot be broken by a programmed machine, how could a robot, as seems to be the case, have killed a human being?

A Sci-Fi film based around the hunt for a robot that might have broken its programming and become sentient. Sound familiar? Yep, it seems a lot like Ridley Scott’s seminal portrait of a dystopian future, the Harrison Ford-starring Blade Runner, doesn’t it? Well, yes - but only because Philip K. Dick, the author of the short story Blade Runner was based on, took so many of his ideas from Asimov.

Blade Runner set the standard for grotty future worlds, and has been imitated so often over the last twenty years that the idea of the future being unpleasant and battered has become yet another Hollywood cliché. It takes a director with a bit of originality to come up with a good variation on the theme, and former music video helmer Alex Proyas certainly does. Chuck in everyone’s favourite wise-cracking male lead with an ability to actually act, Will Smith, and this looks like a sure-fire hit, so why the slight hesitation to heap on the praise?

The only potential problem, as is sadly still the case with altogether too many films, is the special effects. The look of the film, far from being as original as Proyas’ cult hits The Crow or Dark City, is very similar to that of Steven Spielberg’s 2002 blockbuster Minority Report – a sleek but real futuristic world, similar to our own, but with fancier cars and all kinds of new technologies that only exist in prototype form (if at all) today. All very well and good, but in terms of Hollywood special effects, two years is a very long time. Computer effects technology has moved on a lot since Minority Report. The physics of the computer generated elements – most obviously the robots – should be more realistic. They simply don’t seem to be affected by the laws of gravity as they should be. Plus there’s the problem that they look a little too much like the battle droids from Star Wars: Episode I for comfort – and that was made five years ago.

However, that’s probably being needlessly picky. Compared to the kinds of effects we had to put up with before the computer revolution of the 1990s, the film is spectacular and, in any case, it is more the ideas than the effects that are the heart of the movie. It has explosions, it has fights, it has car chases – all the usual ingredients for a summer blockbuster – but more unusually it has a certain amount of intelligence. It’s well worth a look and, if you aren’t bothered by the similarities in style to other films of the genre, it could well end up a favourite.

posted by Nosemonkey @ 12:00 AM