It would be far too easy for me to loudly declare that José Padilha’s shiny new “RoboCop” update is nowhere near as good as the original “RoboCop” from 1987 and then be done with it; to condemn it for lacking the smarts, the charm, the razor-sharp wit and the juicy satire of the Paul Verhoeven classic and then simply walk away. It would also be too easy to complain about the film’s much-derided PG-13 rating, which stands in bold opposition to the original’s hard-R certification; while Verhoeven’s gutter-tongued, ultraviolent sci-fi was splattered in guts and gore, Padilha’s remake takes a far more family-friendly approach; I counted a single puddle of blood and the one use of the F word — or, to be more precise, the MF word — is bleeped out.
It doesn’t take a neuro-engineer’s degree to see why hardcore fans of the Verhoeven version are pissed off — this is their favourite late-’80s blast-em-up, neutered and lobotomised for the young teen demographic. But to me, tearing down this reinvented “RoboCop” for being too tame and studio-manufactured seems a little too dismissive and knee-jerky. Because if you wipe your memory of the original film and meet this on its own terms — difficult, admittedly, considering the amount of cribbed lines and design choices (Jackie Earle Haley actually says, “I wouldn't buy that for a dollar,” I'm not kidding) — and this “RoboCop” reboot is, believe it or not, perfectly serviceable popcorn sci-fi. Now, that's certainly not what the original “RoboCop” was — it was far more daring and profound, and still is — but take this for what it is and you have a solid enough hi-tech blockbuster boasting a few scoopfuls of brain matter, plenty of style and surprising heart, if precious little blood splatter.
Besides, Padilha does manage to set his film apart from Verhoeven’s, to a certain degree. The bare bones of the plot are basically the same: in 2028 Detroit, straight-arrow police detective Alex Murphy, now played by Joel Kinnaman of the US “The Killing,” is critically injured by violent crooks. Facing death’s door, he’s taken in by robotics mega-corporation OmniCorp and reborn as the cyborg RoboCop, the future of law enforcement. What’s different is how RoboCop develops throughout the course of the story. In Verhoeven’s version, RoboCop starts off as a machine thoughtlessly following its prime directives before slowly but surely regaining its humanity. In the Padilha version it’s a little more complicated: RoboCop starts off as Murphy, his memories and personality fully intact, is stripped of his emotions when he becomes unstable and then, to the bewilderment of his creators, begins to override his programming.
What this means is that Padilha’s film lacks the (brilliant) streamlined simplicity of Verhoeven’s film — lengthy scenes featuring a distraught Murphy coming to terms with his situation and undergoing combat training could do with some trimming — but does have more focus on Murphy as a person, albeit a horribly mangled person stuck inside a robo-suit. More time is also dedicated to Murphy’s family, who in Verhoeven’s film appeared only in brief flashbacks. Here, mother and son Clara (Abbie Cornish) and David (John Paul Ruttan) are often at the front and centre of the plot: though visited by Murphy soon after his transformation, Clara and David become increasingly concerned when OmniCorp refuse them access to him. Perhaps their boosted presence overstuffs the plot, but they do lend proceedings a certain dramatic heft and aid in our emotional connection to Murphy and indeed the film.
Of course, there's a ton of CGI action on display, which Padilha handles efficiently and which should satisfy the teenage crowd. And as any fan should know, no “RoboCop” remake would be complete without some biting satire, and Padilha’s film gives it a good chomp: there are clear stabs at American businesses, politics and the media, although they’re less a fatal plunge into the dark heart of America than a slap on the wrist. An opening scene featuring an armed military drone shooting a kid dead on the streets of Tehran fits neatly into the US’s ongoing drone controversy. And like in the original, there’s a clear anti-corruption stance: Michael Keaton gets to be deliciously slimy as Raymond Sellars, the crooked head of OmniCorp, and Gary Oldman is on fine form as the genius scientist who finds himself compromised by the soulless, PR-driven world of big business. Samuel L. Jackson, meanwhile, plays a ranting, uber-patriotic, one-sided media mogul who is in no way inspired by any ranting, uber-patriotic, one-sided media moguls associated with any real American news networks like, oh I dunno, Fox News. Ahem.
But what ultimately makes Padilha’s version a success, albeit a mild one, is not the political satire, nor the CGI action. It’s that in amongst its flashy visuals and overblown set-pieces it doesn’t lose sight of it and its predecessor’s central concern: that being the all-important question, is RoboCop a machine or is he a man? Padilha understands what made Peter Weller’s man-in-a-can really tick back in ’87, his internal conflict between his programming and his humanity, and has kept that largely intact. That’s not to say that Kinnaman’s RoboCop is as compelling as Weller’s — Kinnaman tries but struggles to set himself apart from Weller’s iconic performance — but it’s those slices of humanity that help keep this from being just another brainless, hollow remake. Padilha's “RoboCop” isn’t the original film, nor did it stand a chance of being it. But it's a relief that it's directed by someone who seems to have an understanding of what made the Verhoeven film work so well. And you have to face it: this is better than it had any right to be.
Rating: 6/10
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