RoboCop
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In Robocop, a murdered police officer is turned into the ultimate crime-fighting machine by Paul Verhoeven. It's hard for me to put my fanboy feelings aside when I review the movie. The movie has a lot of action, great scenes, and a cool idea. Robocop is one of the best movies I've ever seen!
A few years from now, Detroit will be a gangster's haven. After the city entered bankruptcy, the Omni Corporation "purchased" the police force to maintain order. But they're losing, and the streets are now ruled by thugs, thieves, murderers, and rapists.
But that is not the end of Officer Murphy!
Murphy's corpse is handed over to the Omni Corporation for use in a top-secret project that, if successful, would create a new sort of officer, a cyborg with impenetrable armor and advanced weapons. The “Robocop Program” is a smashing success, spearheaded by Bob Morton (Miguel Ferrer), who fought against Omni's senior executive Dick Smith (Ronny Cox) to acquire money for his idea.
Robocop is a sci-fi action film with some spectacular sequences. When Murphy and Boddicker's crew first meet, it's a bloodbath (Boddicker shoots Murphy's hand off with a shotgun) (in the uncut version, anyway). In the Omni Corporation's board room, Dick Jones is demonstrating his own pet project, the ED-209, an imposing robot with a powerful armament. Unfortunately, the ED-209 has certain flaws, as seen when it blasts out Kinney (Kevin Page), the young CEO who volunteered to be a test subject!
In the streets, Robocop battles Boddicker and his gang, the action becomes even more exciting. It's Robocop's first night out, and Emil (Paul McCrane), one of Boddicker's men, is holding an automatic rifle to a gas station attendant's throat. Apart from being an exciting fight scene, Robocop's encounter with Emil brings up flashbacks of his previous existence after identifying him as one of the murders of Murphy.
And there are even interesting commercial breaks, like one for a family board game based on thermonuclear war, throughout these broadcasts. As a consequence, you will never be bored watching Robocop since director Verhoeven has thrown in everything but the kitchen sink.
As if this wasn't enough, Robocop even talks about what it means to be human, and how your body can be changed but your memories can't be changed. Verhoeven's film talks about a lot of different things, like corporate greed, rampant crime, and personal identity, which comes up when Robocop / Murphy starts remembering his life before the suit.
A message-driven film, Robocop has something for everyone.
There's no need to do anything if you don't want to.
This is very funny. Before the MPAA Code and Ratings Administration asked for it to be cut down, I don't know if it was even more funny. It is funny in the same way that the assembly line in Chaplin's "Modern Times" is funny. There is something funny about logic being used in a situation where it doesn't make sense.
The film is set in an unnamed future Detroit, when gang violence reigns. A slew of violent officer murders has occurred. A huge firm wants to offer robot police to fight crime, but the demonstration model is clearly inadequate.
Before Weller was shot, Nancy Allen starred in the movie as a woman cop who worked with him. In the beginning, she sees something familiar about the robocop, but she doesn't know what it was at first. It's Weller, her old partner, who is inside that steel suit. It shouldn't have taken her long to figure that out, since Weller's original nose, mouth, chin, and jaw are all visible to the naked eye. Batman and Robin say that if you can't see the eyes of someone you know, you won't be able to recognize them. His inventor, on the other hand, agrees with them.
The narrative progresses along more or less classic thriller lines. But this isn't your average thriller. Paul Verhoeven, a talented Dutch filmmaker, directed "Soldier of Orange." His films defy easy categorization. This film contains slapstick humor. There is love. There is some philosophy centered on the question, "What is a man?" There's also social satire, as the robocop adopts some of Bernhard Goetz's characteristics and fan base.
I laughed at myself. No one else did. To make the commands seem like they came from an authority that could not be appealed to, the robotic audio style was chosen. The recorded message could have been made with a normal human voice. In "RoboCop," Verhoeven and Weller get a lot of mileage out of the conflict between that utterly assured voice and the increasingly confused being behind it.
The majority of thriller and special-effects films are made to order. You can predict every turn of events and almost always be correct. "RoboCop" is a thriller unlike any other.
Box office
RoboCop never reclaimed the top place, but stayed in the top 10 for 6 weeks. The picture made over $53.4 million throughout its theatrical run, making it a minor hit. After Crocodile Dundee ($53.6 million), La Bamba ($54.2 million), comedy picture and Dragnet ($57.4 million), it was the year's fourteenth highest earning film. No figures regarding the film's performance outside North America are known.
RoboCop got a lot of great feedback when it first came out. The film had an average letter grade of "A–" in audience surveys conducted by CinemaScore.
Aliens (1986), The Terminator (1984), and the stories of Frankenstein (1931), Repo Man (1984), and Miami Vice were all influenced by the film. RoboCop created a unique, futuristic vision for Detroit, just like Blade Runner had done for Los Angeles, two reviewers said, like the movie. People who saw the movie didn't know where to start when trying to figure out what kind of movie it was. They said that it had elements of social satire and philosophy mixed with action and science-fiction, but not in the same way that other movies had.
Verhoeven's directing was praised by several outlets as brilliant and darkly funny, with keen social satire that, according to The Washington Post, would have been a straightforward action picture in the hands of another filmmaker. Others, like Dave Kehr and the Chicago Reader, thought the movie was over-directed, with Verhoeven's European filmmaking style missing in rhythm, intensity, and pace. Verhoeven's usual skill in portraying the "sleazily psychological" via physicality, according to the Chicago Reader, failed to appropriately exploit RoboCop's "Aryan blandness" Weller's ability to evoke compassion and express chivalry and sensitivity while mainly hidden behind a massive costume was commended by both the Washington Post and Roger Ebert. According to The Washington Post, Weller had a certain elegance and grace that gave him a mythological air and contributed to the horror of his death. Weller, on the other hand, according the Chicago Reader, "hardly registered" beneath the mask. Nancy Allen was praised by Variety as the film's sole human warmth, while Kurtwood Smith was praised as a well-cast "sicko sadist"
Among the film's most successful efforts, according to Kehr and The Washington Post, was its satire of corporations and the interchangeable use of corporate executives and street-level criminals to show their unchecked greed and callous disregard alongside witty criticisms of subjects such as game shows and military culture. While some viewers appreciated this adaptation of an old-fashioned story about an individual's quest for justice and redemption, the Los Angeles Times noted the film's transformation of a typical cliché revenge story into a mechanical character that keeps succumbing to human emotions, feelings, and ideas. It was pleasing to the Los Angeles Times and Philadelphia Inquirer that RoboCop's triumph gave a parable of a virtuous hero battling back against corruption, villains and the stealing of his humanity, with morality and technology on his side, since it offered a parable. The Washington Post concurred that the film's storyline was well-crafted "With all our flesh-and-blood heroes failing us—from brokers to baseball players—we need a man of mettle, a real straight shooter who doesn't fool around with Phi Beta Kappas and never puts anything up his nose. We need a man like Murphy." 'RoboCop' is what our planet desperately needs."
Decker Shado @ Riffs and Reviews // Decker Shado Online
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