‘Dead or alive, you’re coming with me…’
When audiences turned out for a film called RoboCop in the summer of 1987, they were probably expecting an entertaining but dumb action movie; what they actually got was a scathing and prescient takedown of Reaganomics, corporate America and the loss of humanity…
In a near-future dystopia, Alex Murphy, a deceased police officer (Peter Weller), is brought back to life as a powerful cyborg to combat the escalating crime problem on the streets of Detroit. Nancy Allen appears as his former partner Anne Lewis, Miguel Ferrer plays RoboCop inventor Bob Morton, and Ronny Cox plays against type as evil corporate overlord Dick Jones.
Master director Paul Verhoeven brings a typically European sensibility to what could have so easily been a mindless action flick. It should be said that it was joint writers Edward Neumeier and Michael Miner who injected much of the film’s satire; however, with Detroit native Neumeier channelling his disgust at the decline of the city’s motor industry into his incendiary script. While audiences missed the satire in Verhoeven’s later work (particularly Starship Troopers), it’s impossible to ignore here, and it’s interesting that this critique of capitalism arrived in the same year as Wall Street, a film that preached the message ‘greed is good’.
Weller’s blankness fits perfectly here, and the fact that he worked with a mime artist for months to master the robotic movements that appear in the film is typical of the effort and commitment that went into every aspect of RoboCop. Special effects legend Rob Bottin (The Thing) produces some incredible, timeless practical effects, Basil Poledouris offers a typically bombastic score, and Verhoeven’s assured and playful direction ensures that RoboCop will always be remembered as one of the most groundbreaking and innovative films of the ’80s – an absolute classic.
