"It's your job, right? You know, the guy who kills me, I hope he does it 'cause he hates my gut...
"It's your job, right? You know, the guy who kills me, I hope he does it 'cause he hates my guts. Not 'cause it's his job" - Sonny (Al Pacino) in 'Dog Day Afternoon' (1975)
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Part man, part machine, all cop... RoboCop is a cult cinema classic of the eighties starring Peter Weller as RoboCop and is directed by the masterful Paul Verhoeven (Total Recall, Starship Troopers, Hollow Man).
The story is set in the near future of a very capitalist America. OCP (Omni Comsumer Products) is a multi billion dollar corporation that arguably owns the country. In the city city of Detroit, there is a major crime wave in progress. The situation has gotten so bad that Security Concepts of OCP has practically bought the police force in Detroit. OCP plans to clean up the streets, they need a 24 hour police unit that doen't need to eat drink or sleep. Their first project, ED 209 fails as it has a habbit of blowing away OCP executives. Then an ambitious young executive seizes the opportunity. He creates a cyborg that will combine both metal and flesh all he needs is an unlucky volenteer.
Enter Alex Murphy (Weller) freshly trasfered cop partnered with officer Anne Louis (Nancy Allen). On thier first day of working together they persue a group of armed robbers, the chase ends at an abandoned powerplant/warehouse. During the bust, Murphy is brutally tortured and killed, he had just became the volenteer OCP was looking for. With his skills as a police officer programmed into a body of steel, Murphy becomes RoboCop, crime prevention unit.
All goes well at first. Robocop stops every low-life he encounters with deadly, piercing, and sometimes gruesome accuracy. But there are forces on the street, and within OCP itself, that will stop at nothing to see this super cyborg violently eliminated...
This film is famous for its graphic violence and let me tell you, there is pleanty of it. I was fortunate enough to see the director's cut version a few months ago and it was fantastic.
The film is also famous for the "RoboCop march" (dum dum dum dum dum, dum dum dum dum), which sounds brilliant during scenes where RoboCop is driving in his squad car, going to kick some low-life a$$!
Paul Verhoeven's vision of the future is shocking realistic and in our present economic climate, it's even more likely to come true. His direction is bold and makes RoboCop appear to be taller than he is due to low camara shots, this idea works very well when watching on widescreen.
The action is constant but doesn't contain the flashiness and style as modern action films do. The action is gritty, realistic and violent as is any of Verhoeven's work ("Total Recall" especially).
The performance from Peter Weller is truely unique and special, recreating bird like movement's when RoboCop to give that feeling that he realy is a cyborg. The man also had a lot of patience as it took him four hours to get into the suit first time plus additional makeup. The other cast members all provide good performances as well but it is Weller who wins first prize as the portrayl of a cyborg with human knowledge and feelings.
RoboCop is truely a classic and far outdos its two sequels (RoboCop 2 recreates the violence successfully but lacks the style of Verhoeven and RoboCop 3 just shouldn't of been made) I applore anyone who doesn't mind scenes of graphic violence to catch this (prefrebley on DVD) as this (in Verhoeven's words) is a film about the cruxifiction and the ressurection of someone trying to do good in a word of capitalist corruption and violence. Dead or alive, you will watch this film!
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