Mstrom42

When I was growing up, one of my favourite authors was Isaac Asimov. I loved his books and his ideas about robots. The man was a genius in the way he wrote, he invented the three laws of Robotics, as the very beginning of the movie tells us, they are: 1) A robot can never harm a human. 2) A robot must obey all human orders unless it conflicts with the first law. 3) A robot must protect itself unless it conflicts with the first two laws.

Because of this and because of the fact that I knew Will Smith was the leading actor in this movie I went into this movie with lowered expectations. I expected to see a corny movie full of explosions and killer robots.

I did get that, or at least the explosions part, but imagine my surprise when the movie ended up exceeding my expectations and more. Even though during the ending credits it says that the movie was suggested by the books by Isaac Asimov most of the movie seemed to play quite well with Isaac Asimov's ideas about robots. The movie played with concepts that Isaac Asimov played with, if the three laws can be made, they can be broken. And it was an Asimov-ish "whodunit" as well.

Will Smith managed to pull off a stunning performance as "Del Spooner", a Chicago detective that is suspicious of robots and is against technology. His acting is much more like his acting in "Enemy of the State" than his performances in his other two Science Fiction flicks, "Independence Day" and "Men in Black". He is a believable character, one that you end up sympathising with as you learn why, exactly, he hates robots so much.

A highly critiqued point usually comes from the fans of the book in that Bridget Moynahan plays Susan Calvin. It is true that Moynahan as Calvin is much younger than the Isaac Asimov version, but beyond that I found her to be a pleasant surprise as well. She plays her persona very well, delivering a wooden, robot-like performance. She is obvious in the fact that she likes robots much more than humans, and her dislike of Spooner is amusing. Over the course of the movie she thaws a little, but not an incredible lot. I find her to be a believable character.

The pure stroke of genius in this movie is the robot, Sonny, who at first reminds one of Data from Star Trek. His character evolves over the course of the story, and Alex Proyas does a good job at keeping us guessing at whether the emotional robot is a "good guy" or not.

This movie, which I've now seen twice, has been raked over the coals so to speak in the realm of artistic licence, but I felt that Isaac Asimov, if he were here, would have been rather pleased with this movie. The only two points of conflict, perhaps, would be the amount of violence against actual robots in the story (he was never that violent in his short stories/books) and the very typical Hollywood blow'emup climax, which, yes, smacked heavily of Terminator for a while there. The ending, I felt, repaired and wrapped up nicely, making up for whatever excessive action went on before it.

Two notes about the cinematography in this movie, first of all, the Matrix scene was not necessary. A character was being chased and did a Trinity pause in mid-air pose, which pulled me out of the movie for a couple seconds. Luckily it wasn't too hard to get back into the movie. Second note was something that I felt was very innovative on the part of Alex Proyas, which was the "camera moving with moving object" shots. I noticed at least three of them in the movie. Very nice film work there. I'm sure it will get horribly overdone in the next few years, but for now it is nice. The CGI also gets honourable mention for making the robots meld so well with their surroundings. Finally CGI has reached a point where they don't seem fake, even for a moment.

In regards to nudity in the movie... I've read a couple of reviews which notice the Moynahan nude in fogged up shower scene, and forget to notice the Will Smith completely nude with no fog shower scene. I must say, as a female viewer it is nice to get the generous end of the stick when it comes to seeing something as, dare I say appealing? as Will Smith's very nicely developed body.

Lastly and in a point that has nothing to do with the movie and more to do with questions brought up by it-- It took until a day later and thinking about the movie some more that I realized that "I, Robot" was also very socially different. As in two of the main characters, including the hero are black males, one woman, and one (male) robot. I didn't find this odd at all in watching it, perhaps because Will Smith is such a recognisable character, but after thinking about it, I felt that this is a very positive sign. It shows, to me, that society is changing. I feel that I wouldn't have been able to see that, even 10-15 years ago and thought nothing of it. I've noticed this before though... that the most gender/social equal views seem to come from science fiction in our media... it is interesting.

Now, of course the movie does bring up some ethical questions like if it's all right to make a servant/slave class out of robots, etc., but all in all I really liked this movie. Any movie that makes you think is a good movie, any movie that gives you fun, drama, action, mystery, and makes you think is a great movie. Thank goodness I, Robot is all of the above.

Chronicles of Riddick, which I just got back from seeing was perhaps one of the worst movies I've ever seen, and this is coming from someone who loves Science Fiction a great deal. This movie was horrible, it made no sense, and then when things started to make a little sense it didn't make the plot any better. Vin Disel can act... as himself, which means the way he always acts-- as the near silent tough guy. I found him much more believable in the Fast and the Furious, and much more laughable in this movie.

There were more cheesy lines in this movie than an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie and Matrix: Revolutions put together. It made me realize why, exactly, we accompany other people to the movies for... to groan together when a movie becomes too unbearable to stand. The characters, all of them, were wooden and cardboard and talked in stilted monosyllable sentences. It was like watching a cruel parody of a great epic like "Lord of the Rings" gone horribly wrong.

The special effects and camera work of the movie does little to save it, but it was at least something to focus on when I couldn't stand the acting (or lack of acting) anymore. There were some really disorientating fight scenes where the use of strobe lights was way overdone and headache inducing.

Any feminist who watches this movie will be blown away by the absurd amount of machismo in this... men posture and posture more, while the women cower in fear and wait to be saved. A minor exception is a bounty hunter girl who is featured along with the rest of her nameless crew. Dame Vaako is put in her place early by a man saying exactly that, but proves herself to be, well, a little more than a sex object as she starts to convince Vaako to overthrow the throne with her. Yay, stereotypical evil woman in tightfitting clothing. That look like they hurt for that matter. Kyra made even less sense, as in the beautiful long haired acrobatic girl who can apparently take care of herself, then still needs Riddick to come save her at least three times in the movie. Was there anything in this movie that wasn't stereotypical? *yawns*

The ending, which was an ending I actually quite enjoyed, I was already so jaded by the rest of the movie to care much.

In conclusion this is a horribly written, horribly constructed, disjointed light show with stilted dialogue and wooden performances. If you must watch this movie watch it for the few times that the cinematography breaks out of headache inducing mode and actually shines, as well as some of the special effects, because you aren't going to get much else out of Chronicles of Riddick.