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	Subtopic	Started By	Posts
	Archive through Dec 28, 2004 Last Post: Jan 02, 2005, 09:25 pm		20

Posted By: Neurolanis Jan 01, 2005 - 06:19 pm

I watched this the other day. Widescreen/DVD. I was amazed to see that it wasn't a bad film. I won't being saying much good about it either, other than that it made me laugh a number of times. If only comedies could come up with funny lines that this movie thows out modestly.

Posted By: Bimillennium Man Jan 02, 2005 - 01:46 am

Looks can be deceiving. After watching robot movies on TV since I was in my early teens, such as The Day The Earth Stood Still and The Forbidden Planet, robots were known to be either tall like Goliath, or bulging around the arms and legs showing immense strength. Even scary-looking like the skeletal terminator in Terminator 3. The robots in I, Robot are really slim and their faces are child-like, innocent-looking and pale-white. They look like harmless human puppets on some string you can use in a puppet show. Their strength I noticed during their attack agginst humans, could easily match the mini-bulldozers or diggers man uses for drainpipe-laying. The movie has taught me what a robot would really look like in the next century.

Posted By: Magus Jan 02, 2005 - 10:45 am

The design for the robots was actually taken from some other movie. I've have to check my files of old issues of EW, but they showed it and they were exactly the same as the ones from some movie made years prior to it.

Posted By: Qray Jan 02, 2005 - 07:42 pm

The design for the robots was actually taken from some other movie. I've have to check my files of old issues of EW, but they showed it and they were exactly the same as the ones from some movie made years prior to it. - Magus

If you remember which movie that was, I'd be interested in knowing.

There was some talk before the movie came out that the I, Robot movie robots were modeled after the robots in the Björk music video, "All Is Full of Love."

You can find a picture comparing a robot from the movie and a robot from the music video at here. The Björkbotis on the left, the 3lawsbot on the right.

While there is obvious similarity, IMO there's enough differences to raise speculation as to whether the design was copied. Both the Björkbot's and the 3lawsbot's browless faces were modeled after real people. In the Björkbot's case it was Björk. In the case of the 3lawsbot, it was Alan Tudyk, the actor that provided the voice for Sonny and did some of the stand in work. This alone, a browless face modeled after a human one, can both raise the question of outright copying of design, or negate it. Personally, I could go either way on the subject.

Then again, Hollywood...copying ideas? That's just crazy, ain't it? ;-])

Posted By: Aldan Jan 02, 2005 - 09:25 pm

Hollywood?? How about music, art and, um, fiction writing? Really, if you want your product to sell, you'll take others' popular ideas and blend and morph them to come up with something that will sell for you. That is why so many fantasy novels have gone Tolkein's route for so long...

Posted By: Neurolanis Jan 03, 2005 - 01:28 pm

Wow. They do look a lot alike.

Posted By: Magus Jan 03, 2005 - 02:47 pm

I'll try to check my archives on that, Qray. I remember they were talking also about how the opening dialogue from Catwoman was ripped off from The Crow and a few other similarities with other modern movies with older ones.

But how about this coincidence of movies that were almost exactly the same and released at the same time.

Antz and A Bug's Life

Volcano and Dante's Peak

Armageddon and Deep Impact

And there's many more. It's just that those are the first to come to mind.

Posted By: Sindatur Jan 04, 2005 - 08:40 am

I watched it this weekend. I found it to be a fun movie. I've heard quite a bit of flak from folks who are fans of the I, Robot books, but, I haven't read any of them, so my perception is colored by knowing the Books.

Posted By: Axzazz De`Nyde Feb 24, 2005 - 04:40 pm

I was not looking forward to this movie. I thought it would just be another choppy Hollywood [bleep]ization of an excellent author's work. But it was actually very good.

I don't think it was a direct adaptation of any of his stories, but I think Asimov would've liked it, and been proud to have inspired it. And I think it turned out better than it would've if they'd tried to adapt one of his old stories to a modern-day movie.

It was funny, and Will Smith has a real talent for that sort of straight comedy. It had good action scenes, but the plot ruled them rather than being ruled by them. And surprisingly, it flowed smoothly, unlike most modern movies. True to Asimov's writing, there was no random Hollywood sex. There was violence, but it was 'clean'...nothing gorier than you would see in a halloween haunted house suitable for children, and all violence in the movie had a justifiable cause behind it. There was none of the typical arbitrary Hollywood violence.