Monday, February 17, 2014

Robocops






Directed by José Padhila, the new Robocop film starts great. The United States is still the world policeman but, in these futuristic times, not many American soldiers sacrifice their lives to make it possible. Our technology takes care of it. Robot soldiers and machines take control of foreign cities —not very successfully sometimes — but with enough good results to have conservative TV pundits like Samuel Jackson — turned into a sort of Bill O’Reilly — pushing to have the same Omnicorp machines patrolling American cities.

Since there is a strong opposition in Congress to allow robots in our streets, the search for a human face of this new mechanized law enforcement that may change the public opinion becomes a search for a hybrid, a human-robot police man. The best moments of the film take place when a scientist –an excellent Gary Oldman, by far, the best of this new Robocop– dedicated to provide limb replacements to amputees, interacts with the ideal candidate, policeman Alex Murphy. Murphy was a victim of an attempt to end his life that later on we realize was not a coincidence. The dialogue between the scientist and the policeman is quite moving, especially when we see a man who, facing his reality for the first time, instinctively prefers death to having this artificial life.

The situation reminded me of those lines by Roman Polansky in “The Tenant” that go more or less like this: If I have my arm severed I can say, me and my arm. If my arms and legs are cut off I can say “me and my limbs”, but if my head is severed off my body, what right has my head to call itself “me”? Well, this is not a light question in the times we live, since technology is now able to create advanced prosthetics that can work and function as real human parts. A remarkable, emotive scene in the film happens early, when the scientist encourages a disgraced artist to play the guitar with two mechanical arms. 

All this is great but then… the movie flops. Let´s see how. 
Since Robocop is too human to beat the machines in terms of effectiveness, his brain is computerized and drugged so that the machine part takes over, something that makes him vastly efficient but at the same time kills whatever is left of Murphy’s humanity. In a twist that everyone expected but that comes out of the blue, totally unjustified by the plot, Murphy regains his human conscience and searches for the criminals that tried to kill him.

After the action scenes de rigueur where Robocop kills criminals armed to the teeth with weapons that came from the police itself, and finding out that the same corporation that created him is behind this web of corruption and crime, Murphy is “unplugged” when he is close to know too much. But of course the repentant scientist releases him before he gets killed and Robocop tries to arrest the president of the corporation only to find out that he is not allowed accomplishing this task by his programming. Then again, in a forceful happy ending that makes no sense, he overcomes this programming by sheer will and finally kills the charismatic but ruthless mogul played by Michael Keaton.

At this point of course we are supposed to cheer for the hero. Unfortunately, by then Robocop has spent all of our good will, and has become a non-entity, a boring and stiff character that makes things that nobody knows how, a character devoid of any sympathy that leaves the humanity of the film to rest in the hands of his suffering wife played by the beautiful Abbey Cornish.

Now, when we compare this multimillion production gone to waste to the modest original Robocop directed by Paul Verhoeven that made multitudes cheer, we have to agree that there is nothing like a good story, well-written dialogues and characters, and a relentless sense of humor: “They fix everything these days” Murphy said famously to his mate that had been shot in the old version. Unafraid of playing the kitsch card, the original Robocop had scenes of pure joy that made the audiences laugh but also sympathize thoroughly with the suffering hero.

The original final confrontation is cathartic and outrageous. We know that Murphy’s programming does not allow him to go after the company officers, but he can finally kill his enemy, a powerful manager of Omnicorp, when his boss, the president of the corporation, turns to the bad guy and says: “you are fired”. We laugh, we cheer. We have a hero with us that makes us proud. 

In comparison, the new Robocop ending feels so empty that only serves to remind us that, in spite of its vast resources, Hollywood cannot fix everything these days.