Being a youngish guy, Rope of Silicon‘s Brad Brevet seems vaguely invested in geek-friendly movie fare (anything CG-driven or based on a superhero comic-book or franchise of any kind), or is at least more willing to tolerate this crap than I am. So when a guy like Brevet says he’s not that aroused by the latest trailer for Jose Padilha‘s Robocop (MGM, 2.12.14), that could mean trouble. I am personally unable to consider this possibility as I’m a huge fan of Padilha‘s Elite Squad: The Enemy Within. I interviewed Padilha in January 2012 — here‘s the piece.
“Social commentary will also figure in Padilha’s Robocop,” I wrote. “[Paul] Verhoeven’s original was a satire of a lot of things (insane corporate greed, ‘life in the big city,’ violent action films) that apply just as much today as they did 25 years ago. ‘The satire element of RoboCop is, I think, needed today,’ Padilha told a Telegraph reporter last month. ‘That kind of social, aggressive satire I haven’t seen done well in movies lately. And it’s almost like the politics and violence in the world is asking for this: ‘Someone please make some satire now!’ So we’re going to keep that edge.”
LexG wrote the following on 1.11.12: “Can’t wait for the WELLSLASH over all this, when the Robo remake is inevitably an OK-but-bland studio action movie, and NOT the Soderberghian, laid-back, Serpico-esque 1974 Eddie Coyle ‘play it safe, lay low, nothing too crazy’ policier Wells is for some reason expecting.”