ROBOCOP
US, 1987, 102 minutes, Colour.
Peter Weller, Dan O' Herlihy, Nancy Allen, Ronny Cox, Miguel Ferrer, Ray Wise.
Directed by Paul Verhoeven.
Robocop is a very slick and very effective action police show set in a near future. It was directed by Dutch director Paul Verhoeven (films like The Sensualist and Survival Run in Holland, Flesh and Blood for the international market).
The film is set in Detroit, a run-down city in need of renovation and jobs. Crime abounds. Technological experts make a robot policeman. When it goes out of control, they take an almost-dead policeman and make him into Robocop. The film is an interesting science-fiction blend with police action - with the touch of the Frankenstein theme and meddling with nature. There is quite an amount of action and violence, especially in the final confrontations.
Peter Weller (Shoot the Moon, Buckaroo Banzai, Leviathan) is effective as Robocop. Nancy Allen is a lively heroine. Ronnie Cox and Miguel Ferrer are the corporate villains and Kurtwood Smith and Paul Mc Crane are the thug villains.
An example of entertaining technological film-making.
1. Futuristic themes? Technology? Police and civil corruption? A variation on the Frankenstein story?
2. The use of Detroit for locations, the inner city, the collapsing city, the need for renew? The touches of ordinary life? Standing in for any American city? Basil Poleidoris and his atmospheric score?
3. The importance of technology: the plan for the city, the future of the American cities, redevelopment? The making of robots for law and order? The ingenuity with Robocop? The artillery Available for law and order and for criminals?
4. The film as a police story: the city, crime, police partners, the death of a partner, loyalty, better policing through machines, the expose and confrontation?
5. The city and the plan, the old man and his vision, the board, Jones and his manipulation, his use of Clarence and his gang, their thuggery, the plans for exploiting vice amongst the builders of the future city?
6. Morton and his technology, the demonstration of the robot and its lack of control, taking Murphy, keeping him alive, setting him up as a cyborg, the experiments about his focus, reconstitution? Morton and his ambition, confrontation with Jones, his death? The effective side of the Robocop keeping order? His ability not to be wounded, to manipulate his machinery and fix himself?
7. The human side of Robocop: Murphy as a person, his relationship with his wife and son, the cowboy with his pistol, the television? His working with Anne Lewis? The confrontation of the thugs, the brutality of his death?
His dreams and his change of constitution? His having feelings but no memory of his family? His getting the computer information about the thugs, about himself? His clash with the criminals - the hold-up store, Emily at the service station? Rescuing the woman from the rapist? Confrontation with Clarence and taping his confession? The build-up to the fight with the thugs and the vengeance? The relationship with Lewis as his partner, her getting help? The final confrontation with Jones?
8. Anne as partner, working with Murphy, witnessing his death, at work, the puzzle about Robocop asking his name, assisting him, the car and Clarence, the fight and her being wounded?
9. The thugs and their role in the city, the brutality of their killing of Murphy, Clarence and his leadership, clashes with Jones, the promise of financial exploitation of the workers? Emil and the service station hold-up? The other members of the gang, the reassembling? Jones and his orders? The military hardware? The set-up for the confrontation, Emil and his going into the toxic waste, his being in the way of Clarence's car, the death of the other thugs?
10. The importance of pace and action? Effective thriller? Themes of future society, crime, civic corruption? Pessimism about the future?
