Will Smith is the man! No matter what role he is in, what he wears, says, or how he acts, he will always be the man! Everything he says seems to be at a level so cool and so fashionable, not even the most powerful people can do a mediocre imitation. Unfortunately, the movie "I, Robot," is not as cool as the man.
"I, Robot" is set in "Sweet Home Chicago," in the fall of 2035, where the pumpkin pie is always delicious, three tall boys will cost a guy almost $50 and robots are becoming a commodity inside and outside of the house.
In the movie, which is loosely based on the short stories by Isaac Asimov with blotched sub plots, Del Spooner (Will Smith) is an anti-robot detective on and off of the force.
Robots in the year 2035 are programmed not to harm humans -- so that they don't take over the world. But when the creator of the robots, Dr. Lanning (James Cromwell), dies, Spooner uncovers clues that suggest the newest robots are more intelligent than the humans think and can cause destruction if they want.
Once Spooner finds out the robots' intentions, the usual twists and turns, car chases and labyrinths of destruction ensue. The movie ends with a war between the humans and their so-called-perfect robots.
"I, Robot" appears it could have been an excellent Playstation 2 game, but not a motion picture. I don't know how people can say the movie was original when all of the film's main concepts and visuals have been done before: the futuristic concept car by an actual automaker ("Minority Report"), the whole idea of robots living, breathing and thinking in our society ("Bicentennial Man") and the all-out war between humans and machines ("The Terminator" movies).
There is no beginning or end to the story in "I, Robot," but only a continuation that launches you off and leaves you hanging in the middle. When the movie starts, there are three laws that are programmed into the robots so they may live among humans. I assumed they were federal laws, but the movie only takes place in a small, closed-off portion of Chicago, so I didn't know if there were any robots anywhere else in the world.
The movie also says that by the time the new robots, the NS-5s, come in, there will be one robot to every five humans. However, in the final battle of humans versus robots, there only seems to be 200 robots. At least in the climactic war in the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, there appeared to be an Orc to every five humans.
I give "I, Robot" three out of five stars. The summer wouldn't be the same without Smith, and even though I liked the concept Lexus in "Minority Report" a little better, the Audi in "I, Robot" is not too shabby.
Reach the reporter at monis.rose@asu.edu
