RoboCop

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.

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/

Which is not to say it was necessary.

Indeed, of all movies made in the 80s, Robocop would have been considered as a very unlikely candidate to be remade at all. The original was a fantastic, gorefest, schlock-filled action hit and that toxic melt sequence lives long in the memory. To reboot it was nothing more than a money-making exercise, but if we overlook the morality of the affair, is the movie any good? Well, it isn't bad, put it that way. Like the original it's set in a dystopian future, and like the original it features Alex Murphy's remains brought back to life in a robot, but it changes a great deal about the story, not least Lewis' gender (Battlefield 4 players will recognise Irish's voice returning as Murphy's partner).

The plot focuses on the Dreyfuss bill which bans the use of robots for law enforcement in the US, because it's felt the absence of emotion makes them unsuitable, despite the success of their deployment everywhere else in the world. Samuel L Jackson's wildly OTT Novak obsesses over that on his night-time soapbox show the Novak Element, and fully supports Omnicorps' Sellers (Keaton) bid to get their product on the streets of the US, Detroit especially.

Murphy's Robocop (built by Oldman's Dr Norton) is a way around that, and thereafter it's a case of 'where it all went wrong'. That very cliché is used constantly but this isn't necessarily a bad thing.

Fans of the original movie should enjoy this, even if it feels slightly pointless. The visual effects are pretty extraordinary in truth, and the action sequences thoroughly enjoyable.

The first review on the page does make a good point - there is no one obvious outright bad guy - unlike the original's brilliant Kurtwood Smith, Murphy isn't up against a particular enemy. However the side issue here is that this kind of misses the point - the change in this movie is that a combination of Omnicorp, his killer, and one or two other characters leads Murphy to a pursuit of avengement. There doesn't need to be a big bad guy - just like video games don't always need a boss fight, movies don't always need a nemesis.

For me the way it's structured doesn't detract.

Fundamentally it's a different movie to the original, a homage which is frankly well made but goes in its own direction.

Whether you like that or not is up to you, but I have personally seen far worse movies.

I just came across a collection of past and present pop culture characters on a social media site and thought to myself "Wow, there was a Robocob reboot? In 2014? How could I have missed this?" The thing is, I didn't miss it. When I watched the trailer just now on imdb, I vaguely recalled some of the scenes about two thirds in. And isn't that really all you need to know about this remake?

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!