Whether the film is true to Asimov's own novellas is a debatable point. In his
writings Asimov constructs stories in which robots remain true to the Three
Laws, but apparently break them, and the challenge is to determine how such a
situation arose. The film does not at its heart have such a premise, but owes
more to The Forbin Project.None the less, the film stands on its own two feet. Will Smith plays an
excellent part as robot-hating detective Del Spooner, who seems hell bent on
proving that robots are not as benign as the rest of the world thinks they
are. He is the ideal man for the job when the professor of the local robotics
company apparently commits suicide, and the culprit for murder seems to be
Sonny the wayward robot who has the ability to override his Three Laws
programming.
It is a true detective story in the spirit of Asimov as Spooner first tracks
down his suspect and then begins to untangle the clues to the wider picture
that is hidden from him. As we follow the 'bread crumbs' with him, there are
plenty of twists and turns, and some rather unexpected, with plenty of action
thrown in. The story holds itself together well with little meandering, but
is far more light-weight than many science fiction fans may prefer. In that
respect it fits fairly well with Asimov who, while loved and acclaimed, has
never been seen as being really on a par with more high-brow authors of the
genre.
While the film may stray from being a true Asimov replicant, it retains much
of his creation, the characters, the idea of a world where we have enslaved
robots to do our bidding only to see them hiccup and backfire, and, what has
almost become accepted as to become destined as some future fact; the
positronic brain.
The robots themselves are quite brilliant creations, a masterpiece of design,
and Alan Tudyk brings Sonny to life with none of the sentimentality of
Bicentennial Man. Totally brutal without compassion, and trying to
discover his purpose in life.
There are few plays towards tear-jerking at all, and only at
the end of the film is it noticeable, and it is within reasonable context.
Across the board there is humour mixed in with the action, but it is kept in
check most of the time. It all adds up to make a mix which is extremely
palatable and easy going.
If there is any major complaint, it is the overt product placement. The opening
scenes are advertising trailers for this product and that, although most
commentators seem to have missed the largest one entirely; US Robotics, the well
renowned manufacturers of modems. In truth, the company took its name from that
described in Asimov's book, and are no doubt delighted to see their names in
such fantastically tall lights, and are playing their association with the film
for all it is worth. I guess being associated with killer robots is seen as a
good thing in our current time frame. Had Asimov unluckily chosen "The Al-Qaeda
Robot Foundry" as his staring company, it would have had to have its name
changed to suit the screenplay. Surprisingly, not one "Intel Inside" nor
"Powered by Microsoft" sticker was spotted on a single robot.
There are some plot holes and particularly for me was how a robot could manage
to hide in a group of 1,000 others all neatly aligned in rows without standing
out like a sore thumb, and that is to ignore entirely that Sonny's eyes are a
different colour to all the other robots.
On the other hand, what others have seen to be plot holes are far from that.
Why didn't the scientist create Sonny to go off and do what's needed to sort
the end of the film out straight away ? Why was all this malarkey needed when
the robot could have been programmed-up and sent off to the police to tell
them how it is ?
Without spoiling the reasonable end-game twist ( which was quite well hidden,
although it should have been pretty obvious with hindsight ), it has to be
accepted that neither scientist nor anything he could have created or done
would have avoided detection and his plan being undone. Only by creating a
convoluted scenario could Spooner be brought in to discover for himself what
was really going on. That is pure Asimov who gave us logical puzzles and
conundrums rather than hardcore action.
In truth the film is much deeper than would be imagined from the trailers and
the promise of a Will Smith lead, although you have to recognise it, as it's
not served up on a plate, and quite a few times subtle clues to the plot and
end-game are dropped into what can easily be dismissed as background chatter
in the midst of main character's narrative scenes.
There is also a potential
to see many issues and parallelisms between the film and reality today, such as
racism, globalisation, techno-fear and techno-dependency, but the topics are
left firmly in the background and remain unaired in the film as being out of
context; it's an action film, not an analysis-flick. These are however the
things you may find yourself discussing after the film has ended, and the
extremely prolonged and pointlessly drawn-out tunnel-chase-come-robot-battle
slips from your mind.
It is a very credible film, imaginative, enjoyable, and even if not pure Asimov,
it was well worth viewing. For sheer entertainment it scores well, Will Smith
acting well bumps the score up, and with its surprising depth of plot, it's a
real winner.
