One has to wonder if some of the big wigs in Hollywood conspired to unleash a trio of ‘80s remakes for Valentine’s Day 2014. Two of the three sort of make sense; they are romance films and include budding stars at the time, like Brooke Shields, Rob Lowe, Demi Moore, and some guy named Tom Cruise.
Then you have an updated version of RoboCop that sticks out like a sore thumb.
As is the case with a handful of 1980s action movies, Paul Verhoeven’s 1987 original holds up remarkably well. Released while Ronald Reagan was still serving as POTUS, the film uses Reaganomics (or “something-de-oh-oh economics – Voodoo economics” – for those who remember Ben Stein’s truncated lecture from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off) to fuel a smart satire of American culture.
In RoboCop (2014) the year is 2028 and the setting is still Detroit. The Michigan city is doing much better here than it is now, yet it is supposedly a cesspool for drugs and homicide. But that’s not the issue. Instead of looking at economics, the satire is in the form of usage of mechanical bots on foreign soil as policing agents. The machines can be found throughout Europe and Asia, yet they are banned in the United States. While it is perfectly fine for a multinational company to profit in foreign territories, Senate-passed legislation has forbidden the use of machines to protect and serve major U.S. metropolitan areas.
OmniCorp, the multinational corporation responsible for the manufacture and sales of militarized robotic drones, is making billions but is losing out on making billions more due to Americans resisting a drone-policing unit in the US of A. And the man stirring the pot looking to push public opinion away from being a “robo-phobic” nation is TV personality Pat Novak (Samuel L. Jackson stealing the show with a patted-down faux Don King wig).
Brazilian director Jose Padilha, heralded for Rio De Janiero set films like Bus 197 and Elite Squad: The Enemy Within, gets the film off to a promising start showing us the drones in action in Iran. While no effort is made to question what is the current state of U.S. foreign policy in countries such as Iran, we the audience are just supposed to take it as it goes. The real kicker is that we are supposed to take OmniCorp as being the bad guys just because it is a successful business worth billions, yet is hemorrhaging money as if it were Enron.
The company’s CEO, Raymond Sellars (Michael Keaton), isn’t a truly despicable guy. He’s not the type who would hire some guys to rough up some hotshot in the company by blowing out his kneecaps and making him crawl to stop a grenade from exploding. No, that’s what Paul Verhoeven would have in a villain. Here, Keaton is more like Steve Jobs if he were allowed to privatize world peace. He would look for a loophole to devise a way for his bots to be on American soil. The idea is to make a machine that is also part man. And it’s up to Dr. Dennett Norton (Gary Oldman) to find the perfect candidate.
Of all the candidates in all the world, it’s once again Detroit officer Alex Murphy (The Killing‘s Joel Kinnaman) that draws the short straw. Determined and dedicated to his profession, and rough around the edges, Murphy is also a loving husband and father. After a car bomb blast severely burns and maims him, Murphy wakes up months later as a cyborg. The suit may be an upgrade than what we got back in 1987, but it lacks heart. Literally. Kinnaman’s Robocop is a head, one hand and a pair of lungs. The rest is metal and circuitry.
While Paul Verhoeven’s original was crafty, using satire to show the decay of America, here we get no satire. Instead, our only outlet to tongue-in-cheek humor is Pat Novak as a political commentator that would be well suited for a hosting gig on the Fox News Channel. There are a few little nods to the 1987 movie, but their placement are oddly forced, like a last ditch effort to sprinkle in some nostalgia to those who still remember the days of Kurtwood Smith as a slimeball before he would become the cankerous dad on That ‘70s Show.
Plus Murphy’s demise this time around lacks the same emotional punch. A car bomb doesn’t quite measure up to Murphy’s horrific Jesus-like death then subsequent resurrection in the original RoboCop. That’s what really irks this reviewer. I can take the improved visual effects, even if the action sequences become too much like a first-person shooting game, but it screws up Murphy’s rebirth as a man-chine in a big way. The coldness and detachment with Murphy’s widow and son relocating outside of Detroit are gone; we retain the wife and child and get a melodrama with Murphy trying to reconnect with them both.
The problem is that talented actors like Joel Kinnaman (watch Snabba Cash aka Easy Money if you don’t believe me) and Abbie Cornish (Bright Star) have to suffer because their characters are so poorly written.
Not even the supporting cast, except for Jackson, can make this be anything but mediocre. That’s a shame, because Jose Padilha is a talented director. Yet, methinks that he wasn’t able to make the film he had envisioned due to having to meet the requirements of the studio. Namely, making something that’s easily digestible (think Twilight readership vs. Tolstoy readership) with a rating that can get teenagers and adults (the dreaded PG-13).
Slick with lots of bells and whistles, RoboCop (2014) lacks the Tin Man’s heart. It would be in your best interest to not waste matinee bucks on this mediocre release. Revisit Paul Verhoeven’s 1987 original again, or watch it for the first time. It still holds up.
Director: Jose Padilha
Writer: Joshua Zetumer; based on Edward Neumeier and Michael Miner’s 1987 screenplay
Notable Cast: Joel Kinnaman, Gary Oldman, Michael Keaton, Abbie Cornish, Jackie Earle Haley, Samuel L. Jackson
