Movie #605: Robocop

Robcop is an action/satire movie directed by Paul Verhoeven and starring Peter Weller, Kurtwood Smith, Ronny Cox, Miguel Ferrer, Nancy Allen, and Paul McCrane.

In the near future, Detroit is falling apart and crime is running rampant. Cops are dying left and right, and a big corporation called OCP is slowly privatizing the police. The union is near calling a strike (the police sergeant, played by Robert DoQui, adorably says "police don't strike"), and the head of OCP, Dick Jones (Cox) is getting ready to release his ridiculous murder robot, ED-209. 

But then ED-209 shoots a dude during a demonstration because some idiot forgot the cardinal rules of gun safety, and Morton (Ferrer), a younger exec, swoops in to pitch his idea - Robocop! All they need is a dead cop.

New to the precinct, Alex Murphy (Weller) obliges by pursuing a gang led by Clarence Boddicker (Smith) into an abandoned factory and getting himself shot repeatedly. OCP turns him into a mostly-metal cyborg, capable of soaking up bullets and tossing criminals around like cotton candy. Over time, though, he comes to remember flashes of his human life, and eventually going after Boddicker, and then Jones. 

So, Robocop is an action movie, but there's also some pretty strong themes of militarization of police, among other things, going on here. I remembered the corruption of OCP and how vicious Jones was (and that he was in league with Boddicker), but I'd forgotten the kind of base-level corruption that Morton and the "Old Man" (Daniel O'Herlihy) display. The production design does a great job of making Detroit look like it's crumbling (not hard), although the weaponry the police use is, if anything, understated compared with what real-life cops get these days.

Peter Weller does a really impressive job. I remembered his movement and line delivery as Robocop, but I'd forgotten his (very brief) performance as just plain ol' Alex Murphy, a cop transferring from a more manageable precinct to the utter shit and violence of the inner city. I like, too, that he's not a supercop or a bad boy with an attitude, but also not a naif - he's just a cop, doing his job, and he gets gunned down. Because of OCP's deal with the department, his body becomes their property and he becomes Robocop. Your move, creep.

In the hands of a different, more American director, this movie had the potential to lose whatever subtlety it has and just be a pure action/superhero kind of movie. As it is, I like what Verhoeven does with it, and I seem to recall the sequel isn't terrible, either (though the third installment, by rights, is pretty shit). 

My Grade: B+
Rewatch Value: Medium-high

Next up: The Rocketeer