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.
