Your #1 Favorite Movie - an In Depth Analysis

Tell us what your #1 favorite movie is.

And then describe, in depth, why you picked that movie.

Why that movie is more important than every other movie you've seen.

I want paragraphs and paragraphs of full explanation. In depth.

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Robocop is not just an ‘actioner’ or a sci-fi, or even a futuristic movie of death and destruction. It’s a long close look at where humanity is going.

The movie in a whole is so far ahead of its time that at 20 odd years ago, when the movie was released, it seemed far-fetched with the police uniforms and cars and society’s views, Military tactics involved in the film and a Police Force that resembles a Peace Keeping Army.
These days though, it seems on the tilting point of dated due to being only a few years behind modern day.

An absolute master class in film making, Verhoeven’s take on the future is a spookily realistic and well imagined view of our future. Something that the near-prophetic Paul Verhoeven is a master of.

Weller as the titular Robocop is another master class on the acting scale. Miming robotic bird movements and bringing a human element to a creature made almost entirely of titanium is a wonder. How he does it, is legend.
The suit itself is the reason his movements are so jerky. They were originally going for fluidic movements… but once the suit arrived and Weller spent 11 hours getting into it, they all realised it just wasn’t going to work.
After a 4 day halt on shooting, Weller and his movement coach discovered that they would have to create a new movement, based on French Mime Artists from the 1920s.
Weller has said that moving like that, is the most unnatural thing he has ever had to do. It had to be big and loud, OTT and hammy-theatrical.

Rob Bottin’s creation of the RoboCop armour/suit and makeup, especially when Robo removes his upper mask, is also a wonder to behold.
Even by today’s standards the practical effects look genuinely real and have yet to be bettered in any movie I’ve yet to see.

What really made RoboCop special though was the quiet moments, where Robo is re-experiencing some of his past, his un-erased memories.
It’s something that really brings the audience on a par with Robo’s torn feelings of duty, love, humanity and sheer programming.
Mixed with the haunting soundtrack, the movie will live with you for a long time, if not forever.

Add to that mix some awesome shoot’ em up action scenes, explosions, black humour and melting men in vats of acid and you’ve got a sure fire hit and the music by the wonderfully enigmatic Basil Poledouris blends everything together perfectly. From the thumping march, to the haunting theme that stands out most prolifically when RoboCop is walking around his old home, remembering his family, Poledouris nails the soundtrack for this movie.
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After a re-watched the remake of RoboCop yesterday, and I've twigged on something about the original that I never noticed before.

I’ll get to the main thing in a moment, but for now I’ll just reiterate what I said in ther review I wrote a while back… in the remake, there are a number of problems with RoboCop himself.
He's a regular guy, in a robotic suit. He knows who he is, what has happened... and has to deal with it. RoboCop himself, always referred to as "Alex", being a regular guy in a suit is a bland character played blandly by Kinnaman. He’s basically Batman. Maybe Iron Man? Iron Bat?
Yeah, Iron Bat.
With less character though.

The main thing though is a very, very subtle character device that puts the viewer smack-bang into the mind-set of RoboCop himself that was totally overlooked in the remake.

In the remake, you meet Alex Murphy's family. You get to see their struggle against the corporate big-wigs and their lawyers.
It’s a bit like the revealing scene in the remake, where RoboCop’s outer shell is removed, allowing us to see his inner workings. In my review I called it a question we never asked, and an answer we didn’t need.

What I’m saying is, we don’t need to see Alex Murphy’s family. Ok, they went the route of having Alex a more ‘human’ RoboCop and seeing his struggle to reconnect to his loved ones is probably called for in the remake… but, well… that just isn’t what RoboCop is about.
In the original, RoboCop is completely mind-wiped (at least, OCP thought they had wiped his memory) and he has to figure out what happened to him… and why… and he has an internal struggle piecing together what he has been turned into... and... most importantly... you never meet his wife and son.

All you see are flash memories of them.
A quick memory here, a vague memory there... which allows RoboCop to piece together that he once had a life, that he was once alive.
This disconnection between the viewer and Alex's family puts the viewer bang on par of the mind-set of what is left of Alex Murphy.
He doesn’t know them and neither do you.
In his own words, he even says "Murphy had a wife and son, what happened to them?"

He has accepted he is no longer Alex Murphy... but that he once was Alex Murphy and he has to deal with and accept that loss, and move on with his, well, move on with his “life”.
He then says "I can feel them, but I can't remember them"

The other major thing with this is when Alex/Robo is talking about his family, mask off, in the factory where he died… his voice changes.
When he’s, let’s say “RoboCop”, his voice is powerful, commanding, bold.
While sitting with Lewis with his mask off, being “Alex” his voice softens. It’s quiet, solemn and packed with human heartache. This tells us that, after all he’s been through, Alex is to an extent, still there and he also knows that to the majority, Alex isn’t there anymore.

This, is the major overlooked point of RoboCop in the remake, and a subtle character arc that I never spotted until that God-awful remake actually appeared.... the viewer not ever meeting Alex’s family, means the viewer understands RoboCop's viewpoint... and is connected emotionally, 100%, to his predicament.

What stands out the most with RoboCop, the thing that people always remember it for, is the violence and the gore… but look just below the surface, just in between the horror, the gore, the violence and the gunfire… is, what I would call, a beautiful story of the human spirit, the enduring and endless boundaries of love and pure emotion, of memories and most of all, the story of pain and loss and dealing with that pain.

Verhoeven, mastered these themes of humanity and mortality throughout the entire movie, and then in his unique, inimitable and peerless style laced the whole thing with the ultra-violence, satire and black humour; showing the viewer what they didn’t realise they wanted to see… and also showing the viewer things that they didn’t realise they didn’t want to see.

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I really thought the first comment would be Deep Throat.

Shawshank Redemption

Because it's the best. I've written a big review before in Hall of Fame 7.

Agree on Hellraiser. This movie freaked me out as a kid and it has never left me. This is probably one of, if not the most influential horror movies of my experience. It does turn a bit soap opera-ish looking back now, but the effects, the characters, the distorted views of love and lust, and the pure drive (if even for the wrong things in life---and death) of man followed by the punishing consequences of that drive all make up for the sometimes overacted romance. Pinhead is an icon due to this movie and I would bet entire generations have no idea why. That is a testament to how powerful the psyche connection is with evil as characterized in this one. IMO, at least.

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"My Dionne Warwick understanding of your dream indicates that you are ambivalent on how you want life to eventually screw you." - Joel

"Ever try to forcibly pin down a house cat? It's not easy." - Captain Steel

"I just can't get pass sticking a finger up a dog's butt." - John Dumbear

Great posts so far! I will have to sit down and write up some thoughts on Blade Runner once I get a free few minutes this week. Meanwhile, Sexy nailed it in regards to Hellraiser - Dark and romantic, for sure. Love that flick.

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I think Blade Runners weight is often underestimated. I mean I don't think you need to highlight how good looking and atmospheric the film is but beyond that and indeed beyond the more obvious commentary on slavery I think its intended to be a representation of modern humanity.

The film is full of religious references of course such as Batty's stigmata and him literally meeting his maker but more specifically I think the Replicants themselves are ment to represent post religious humans. Limited lifespans highlighting morality relatively to a modern view of the vastness of time and created purely by science highlighting the replacement of some divine creation with evolutionary theory.

You have Rachael dealing with the trusting emotions in this situation and Batty highlighting the wealth of experience of his life after saving his enemy plus Deckard himself coming to value life as the story progresses.

That's also why I think Scott(who's older brother had just died quite young lmaybe giving the influence for making such a film?) has Deckard as a replincant, its not intended to be a "who done it?" style mystery but rather a confirmation of the above, replicants as post religious humans have the same worth and then the protagonist, the stand in for the audience is revealed to be one himself.