Have you ever seen the film Short Circuit? It stars Steve Guttenberg and Ally Sheedy about a military robot who gets struck by lightening and comes "alive." This is the first thought my brain went to as I watched the trailer for CHAPPiE. I felt like it was a modern take on the 1980's film.
In the near future, a squad of police robots are made to bring down crime in a foreign land. The robot's designer, played by Dev Patel, has even went a step further and created true artificial intelligence with CHAPPiE. But a trio of criminals want to use CHAPPiE to help them with their work. Meanwhile, a competing engineer, played by Hugh Jackman, is looking to use CHAPPiE as an excuse to push his own robot design, and create urban chaos in the process.
As I browsed online for reviews of this film they seemed mainly negative. But I don't see why. My only problem with the movie was the ending. There were too many slow motions shots during the final battle, which loses it's effect, and I'm not quite yet sure how I feel about the way Patel's character ended up. But I thought the story of CHAPPiE was quite entertaining and I applaud director Neill Blonkamp by making a robot the most human character in the film.
Sigorney Weaver also guest starred in the movie, who is said to be working with Blonkamp on the next Alien film. But her part seemed was so small I don't believe it was of any significance. Jackman however gave a refreshing performance by playing the film's true villian, a role we have not yet seen him play. The best bad guys are the ones you are rooting for to die in the end, and I was definitely wanting Jackman to get what's coming to him.
I would be interested in seeing a sequel to this film just to see how the story continues for CHAPPiE and his maker. I think Blonkamp's style is great and I'm looking forward to seeing what he does with the Alien franchise. There were moments in this movie that made my heart break, and times I quietly cheered, and that's what I consider a good movie; when you got through the range of emotions and hope everything turns out OK in the end.
MY RATING: B-
No comments:
Post a Comment