"RoboCop (2014)" MOVIE REVIEW

Synopsis

In RoboCop, the year is 2028 and multinational conglomerate OmniCorp is at the center of robot technology. Overseas, their drones have been used by the military for years - and it's meant billions for OmniCorp's bottom line. Now OmniCorp wants to bring their controversial technology to the home front, and they see a golden opportunity to do it. When Alex Murphy (Joel Kinnaman) - a loving husband, father and good cop doing his best to stem the tide of crime and corruption in Detroit - is critically injured in the line of duty, OmniCorp sees their chance to build a part-man, part-robot police officer. OmniCorp envisions a RoboCop in every city and even more billions for their shareholders, but they never counted on one thing: there is still a man inside the machine pursuing justice.

The Review

What's up with Hollywood and remakes? I mean sure they go for the dead franchises (most of the time) and reinterpret them for the modern and contemporary audience. RoboCop was a classic way back 1987, but the sequels, the comics, the animated series that came after, let's just say every fan, everyone and everybody wanted to forget those existed. So why a remake? did anyone asked for it? how good was this remake?

Like my review of the original movie, let us first talk about the hero himself, RoboCop. Believe it or not, there's not much difference between with Alex Murphy. He feels very familiar to those who knew him way back, which is a good thing. He's badass, a very relatable family-guy. The only difference is that we get to see more of his human elements throughout the movie. It's a very good aspect for Alex Murphy, but maybe a problem for RoboCop. Way back at the classic film, almost every human aspect of RoboCop was stripped away from him entirely, with showing very little emotions at very little given time. This movie's RoboCop however is the opposite of that. He's still a man, fighting for his humanity all throughout the film under some circumstances. He's a Robo-Man-Cop, having an identity crisis of his own of who's in control; the part man or the part machine? Despite of this re-imagining, actor Joel Kinnaman still brings a spectacular performance as both characters. 

The action sequences is top-notch and very entertaining. The story, despite having similar themes to the original, is very different. First there is the PG-13 rating which makes this movie friendlier than the original, and yes you can have your 8 year old kids see this movie in the theaters. With that being said, the rating did however limited the movie's potential for grit. The themes of corruption, social displacement, authoritarianism and the biased media is still there but was never given any chance to be fully prominent making this universe seem less dystopian. The exploration of the human element in this movie is that aspect of the story that did stand out, making you like and care about the characters that you should like and care about, and hate the characters that you should hate. Though maybe it's not enough make-up for the constant lacking of this film, and talk about that anti-climatic ending.

Thankfully, the special effects and the production design isn't as problematic as everyone thought it would be. A few nods to the original franchise can bring a smile to a few faces. The cast did the best they could for this flick. 

Final Verdict

Overall, there's not really much about this film. Sure it's lightyears better than RoboCop 2 and beyond but it's still an enjoyable popcorn-flick.The movie has enough to get you invested with some of the characters, the story did it's best and did well for trying to be different and new.  When you're gonna do a remake, atleast do it like RoboCop. Don't just remake the whole thing, re-interpret it in ways that is fresh and new to the audience. Hoped it had a little more effort to it, but there is always room for improvement, hopefully when a sequel gets made.