The new Robocop is more of a visual experience and a delight for those looking forward to high-speed action and technology thrown at your face. But to be honest, it doesn’t score high with thinkers. And yet, far from being a let-down, the movie feebly manages to stand its ground. Robocop is an attempt by director Padilha at creating a movie that revolves around the titular character and its origin. In a way it should be seen as a franchise-reboot (although I’m hoping they comeback with better sequels). The backdrop of movie is a future “robo-phobic” America where Omnicorp, manufacturer of law enforcement robots, is in conflict with the government to get its products on American streets. The story is about Alex Murphy, played by Joel Kinnaman, a Detroit city cop who in his attempt to catch local drug lord, gets blasted to pieces. Failing to get his product on the streets, Raymond Sellars (Michael Keaton), the CEO of Omnicorp, convinces his lead researcher Dr. Norton (Gary Oldman) to create a cyborg. What follows is the creation of Robocop and his vengeance.
Robocop is a somewhat convincing take on the character’s origin, but fails to be anything greater than that. One thing that you miss the most during the movie is humor. It feels like the movie attempts to create a darker version of Robocop but ironically only manages to do so with its color (there’s a black as well as a chrome version). Another thing that disappoints is the way characters are written. I couldn’t figure out what Jay Baruchel was doing in this movie. Samuel Jackson would pop up at odd times like a TV commercial - there was a point where I thought he would start saying “every purchase, everywhere ...”. Michael Keaton fails to portray a badass villain. And it was much more pleasurable to see Robocop with his visor on. On the brighter side, Gary Oldman brings some believability into the role of Dr. Norton (again which could have been written better) and you wish to see more of Jennifer Ehle.
Robocop is a movie you should watch if you like action, technology or black cyborgs. Or like me, for all it could have been and wasn’t, you just hope that they come up with a really well scripted sequel to salvage the series (Which I really do!).
Grade: B
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