Now I'm in a minority for reviewing this. I didn't love the original, but I also didn't dislike it. So going into this film, I didn't have a fans mindset. That being said, let's talk about Robocop.
Robocop is a recent remake of the 1980s action film about a cop who gets totally blown to bits, and so this company takes advantage of the situation and turns him into a cyborg. This new one starts Joel Kinniman as the title character, and it's also got Michael Keaton, Samuel L. Jackson, & (my favourite actor) Gary Oldman.
If you remember my Top 5 Surprises of 2013, I said that the 2013 Evil Dead was a bit surprise by being an honest and yet creative remake. And this film, to a certain extent, follows that. Sure, obviously in this age of film this version is a lot grittier and darker than the first film, but they make up for this by having some of the action elements of the original.
On the topic of the action, I gotta say it was really cool. From the start of the film, the action is engaging and intense, and it just keeps getting better from there. There was one action scene in particular that was really cool, if you've seen the new Robocop you might now what I'm talking about. Basically, it involves a lot of night vision, switching back & forth between robocop and various goon, and it's pretty awesome.
The thing with this film is, usually I'd say you see a film like this to be entertained, caring about acting and actual dramatic elements would be fairly redundant. However, I'm going to talk about those elements in this film, because they were actually pretty good. Overall the direction is good, the story was engaging, and the acting was pretty good, especially for an action films standards.
Samuel L. Jackson & Gary Oldman were, for their own reasons, the highlights of the film for me. Gary Oldman is a fine actor, even if he's done some bad films I've never seen a bad performance from him. This is certainly no exception, he totally kills it in his role, and is very believable. As for Sam Jackson, he owned this film. Even if the action scenes had put you off, it's hard to argue that his scenes weren't cool. Like the original, his scenes satirized modern news. However, this one seemed very particularly mocking Fox news, and he was awesome on screen as the role of what was basically Fox news.
The cgi in the film was cool too, it blended really well with the background, and even though some shots looked fake, and you can tell other times there's a green screen behind them, it worked really well. The robots in the film also looked really real, unlike movies like transformers where everything looks a little off, the robots in this film looked like they were there.
The pacing in the film is one of the bigger issues for me. Granted you've gotta have dramatic moments, the whole thing can't be completely action filled. But while the original film shows us small elements of morality, this film really focuses on it. And at first it seems cool, like they're adding more depth. But it reached a point where the film seems kind of pre-occupied with it's message. The section early in the film with all the training could've been cut down, it wouldn't have changed the film a whole lot.
Another issue I have with the film was that, just like the original, it's pretty predictable. And I know predictability is a given with remakes, but there was a lot of stuff in this film that wasn't in the original, but those things were all really predictable.
Final Rating
The new Robocop is a pretty good action film, this isn't exactly a must-see, and if you're a fan of the original you'll probably be disappointed. But, if you're in a movie theatre, it's this or Winters Tale. So I'll leave you to think about your decision.
Robocop: 3/5
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