I, Robot: Me, unimpressed. You, better off doing something else.
In a very loose adaptation of Issac Asimov’s classic book, I, Robot imagines a futuristic world 30 years from now, where friendly, eager-to-please robots are members of every household; where one miswired robot is suspected of murder; and where an entire robot revolution can be squashed by a wisecracking, sweet potato pie-eating cop in a skullcap and Converse sneakers.
That would be Will Smith, as Det. Spooner (a character not in the book, fork you very much), a homicide cop investigating the apparent suicide of a prominent robot inventor at the office of U.S. Robotics. All signs point to a new-model robot with the high-tech name of Sonny, although no robot has ever committed a crime before, being programmed with three laws which state, in essence, that no robot may ever harm a human; that a robot must obey human orders, as long as it doesn’t harm humans; and a robot must protect its own existence, also as long as it doesn’t harm humans. (These rules, unfortunately, do not extend to the audience.)
I, Robot doesn’t have a bad premise, just bad execution. My main problem with this movie lies with a miscast Smith. Continuously walking with a rap-video swagger, he has two modes of acting, each inappropriate: In normal situations, he’s over-the-top and shouting, while in times of life-threatening danger, he’s suddenly under the spotlight at Catch a Rising Star, lobbing leftovers from his Men in Black II quipbook. These ineffectual attempts at comedy include such one-liners as “Aw, hell, no!,” “Get off my car!” and — well, this is new — “Hold my pie!”
But he’s not the only actor to blame. As robot psychologist Dr. Susan Calvin, model-turned-actress (in theory, at least) Bridget Moynahan is quite robotic herself, and looks to be on the verge of tears with every line reading. The best performances come from the robots, and they’re computer-generated. In fact, there are times in this movie where everything onscreen is computer-generated, turning I, Robot into, quite literally, a cartoon.
Gifted director Alex Proyas (Dark City, The Crow) doesn’t help matters, forever swirling his camera as if it were a gyroscope, killing all sense of perspective in the action scenes and nearly requiring a dose or two of Dramamine. All he’s done here is created yet another megaexpensive sci-fi film with big, dumb moments out of place for the antiseptic tone he initially sets. I can see the script meetings now: “And the explosion will hurl Will out of the house, only he won’t get hurt because he’ll use a door like a surfboard and land safely in the pond outside! And he’ll do this while saving a kitty!” In keeping with Hollywood blockbuster mentality, all feats of derring-do are filmed in slow motion, all plot points are telegraphed far in advance, and all people unloading shotguns do so with lips pursed in a scowl. —Rod Lott
While not as good as Dark City, I enjoy I Robot. Don’t look for Asimov robots in the movie and It becomes a very enjoyable film. I like Will Smith this movie. I think this his character has a background that he manages to bring to the film without being obivious. For example early in the film, you see him shower and his arm is hanging down in a unnatural way. Some different about that arm. We don’t find out what till latter in the film. Will Smith bring out a interesting under layer to the character then this review implies.
As for Bridget Moynahan, yes her character seem robotic. It the one thing that the writers took from Asimov stories unchanged. She supose to be that way. And yet Moynahan also give a layer profromance that show that she also is a more complex person than she seem at frist glance.
What bugs me the most about I Robot is instead of Asimov complex stories about Human and Machine interaction, The film makers mainly goes for a computer running amok that Hollywood been doing ever since “2001” Hal. Still it better than most Of these type films.