RoboCop

Why am I writing about RoboCop (1987) in the year 2000?  Who will ever read these comments?

I just purchased RoboCop on DVD from the Criterion Collection and it still works now as it did then.  This is an ultra-violent film in many ways, and then there is humor and hope and justice in it as well.

I remember the first time I saw the film.  When Murphy gets gunned down by the gang, I was so full of rage it was hard to contain myself.  I even felt bad when the young VP gets blown up by Clarence.  The character of Clarence Boddiker (sp?) was so truly despicable that I still refer to the actor as "Clarence" whenever I see him (e.g. "That 70's Show" on Fox) and I shudder.

I remember saying, kind of out loud, "You're fired," just moments before it was said in the film.

The way the film meted out justice, with its poignant moments and powerful ending, made all of the previous over the top violence tolerable in a way that cannot be said for over-hyped gore fests such as "Natural Born Killers" (not to compare the two films, they're vastly different -- but, I'm not a fan of ultra violent flicks.  I'll never watch NBK again, because it is so violent and there is no pay back, whereas the bad people in RoboCop definitely get what they deserve.

I'm not going to say much about the film here because I think it has so many good points, I could write an extensive essay on it.  I give it a 10 out of 10 with the acknowledgement that it cannot be for everyone.

I watching the film commentary, I will say that the speakers (director, producer and writer) make mention of something about how this film works as a Sci-Fi movie, which is similar to a comment I made about the recent "X-Men."  They say that this film, while in the not too distant future, does not have a lot of sureal or futuristic aspects to it.  Basically, they have the robot (ED-209), and RoboCop, and that's about it.  It works, because the world they present is not so different from our own.  I made the same observation about "X-Men" saying that, yes, you have mutants, you have Xavier's school and Magneto's hideaway, then everything else is pretty much as it is in the current world.  For both of these films, I thought it strengthened their believability over the comic book world of "Batman."  I don't think this is the most powerful observation one can make on this film, but I mention it because it did strike a chord with me as an aspect that can make a film work for a lot of people.  If you present it as completely Sci-Fi, or comic book, you shut off a lot of potential audience because there are a lot of people who just aren't going to buy into these alternate worlds.

To sum up, if you like RoboCop, watch it again, anytime, and you'll see that you still enjoy it.  If you haven't seen it, give it a try, but know that it is violent.  If you have a chance to see the Criterion version, check it out and enjoy the extras!

1-21-2001