It is rumored that Darren Aronofsky (The Wrestler, The Fountain, Requiem for a Dream) wants to do a re-make of this film. As awesome as this would be I don't know if it is possible to do anything more rad than what has already been done. He also has been trying to get funding for a movie that features Mark Wahlberg as a boxer. Apparently Wahlberg has been training for like five years for this role. I would see both movies were he to make either one of them. I'm already too jacked just about the idea of either movie. At any rate, RoboCop is one of the most timeless movies to ever be made. If your girlfriend or boyfriend does not think Robocop is one of the best movies ever made then he or she sucks and you need to move on. I'm not even going to waste time with a synopsis because if you have not seen it then you just need to see it already. People have freaking wrote dissertations on it; which is braggable.
Themes that have been copied a hundred times over include; dualisms in human nature, man vs. machine, the inevitable decay of American industrialism, Christ figures as heroes, rebirth, and weapons proliferation. When you combine this stuff with splatter punks and Clint Eastwood-esque one liners then you have one of the best movies ever made.
RoboCop is what movies are supposed to be. An amalgamation of surrealism with really fun stuff - the Ford Taurus was chosen as the badass car to be featured while the Pontiac 600, Ford Taurus' competition was renamed 6000 Sux and given to the bad guys. It is often really annoying to see a bunch of indie films that work really hard to evoke all these emotions in the audience which is usually pseudo-intellectuals or post-Bowling for Columbine, non-athletic teenagers that love The Shins. We would be better served with movies that remind us that non-Ingmar Bergman films are supposed to be fun. Even Bergman films can be fun if you are present enough to recognize that you are watching a movie that was shot, cut, and produced to be fantasy and promote a thesis. I think we forget that movies are movies. Obviously there are movies like Shindler's List that is not fun at all, in fact it just kind of sucks to watch movies like this but there is a time and place for each. My point is this, let's not forget that movies can just be really fun events and we don't have to write really witty responses to movies about teenage pregnancy. Just say a movie is fun and be done with it.
RoboCop is fun and you need to see it if you haven't. If you have seen it then you need to see it again. If you have seen it like a hundred times then you are cooler than everyone else.
dude:
ReplyDeleteI'm with you, but do you think there comes a point when the technical and artistic drawbacks of a movie keep it from being fun? Where it becomes uninteresting or just too sucky to get in to? * Conan the Barbarian is not an example of this. It only kicks ass: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PQ6335puOc
Subquestion:
ReplyDeleteAre movies getting better? (Adam and I battled over this)
James,
ReplyDeleteIn regard to your subquestion, I'd like to suggest that they're getting better and worse. There are more movies now than ever, so there are lots of bad ones (cf any film festival that's not famous, 98% of documentaries, and the kinds of lazy hipsters that come out of film school, plus the occasional block buster bust). But there are also really good movies that come out every year, and some of them are better than the ones from last year. Is not every McConaughey movie better than the last?
I'd like to amend your question. I watched Conan the Barbarian when I was sick one time as a little kid. I think it was the flu, which makes me wonder which is better, movies or vaccines?
1) Yes, there is a point when artistic or technical drawbacks keep it from being a fun movie. I think of the Soloist. I can always do without doves flying against a backlit corridor.
ReplyDelete2) I'm not sure you could say for sure if movies are better or not. Rob is right, we make a lot more of them. I'm going to have to think about this crap for bit.
3) Every McConaughey movie is in my top five so I can't even begin to say one is better than the other.
4) Conan is better than vaccines.
I just recently watched "The Wrestler" and was freaking blown away, only to be let down by the fact that I had no one to discuss it with here.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I've watched a pirated copy of "Surfer Dude" about 6 times. The opening scene has McConaughey in a tank top (probably a tribute to Luke) and after that I think it turns into a documentary on McConaughey's real life.