WEBVTT - Weirdhouse Cinema Rewind: RoboCop (1987) 0:00:04.440 --> 0:00:08.280 Hey, Welcome to Weird House Cinema. Rewind. This is Rob Lamb, 0:00:08.320 --> 0:00:11.840 and today we are going to rerun our episode on 0:00:12.240 --> 0:00:17.320 nineteen eighty seven's RoboCop. Yes, the ultraviolent sci fi action 0:00:17.520 --> 0:00:22.959 classic that is as deeply satirical as it is gratuitously violent. 0:00:23.480 --> 0:00:28.240 Originally published twelve one, twenty three. Let's dive right in. 0:00:32.159 --> 0:00:39.519 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:41.960 --> 0:00:45.680 Hey, welcome to Weird House Cinema. This is Rob Lamb. 0:00:45.720 --> 0:00:48.560 And this is Joe McCormick. And today we are going 0:00:48.560 --> 0:00:50.479 to be featuring a movie that I feel like is 0:00:50.560 --> 0:00:55.200 kind of a foundational text for my adult appreciation of cinema. 0:00:55.680 --> 0:00:59.160 It is the nineteen eighty seven sci fi action satire 0:00:59.520 --> 0:01:04.640 robo Cop, directed by Paul Verhoven. Rob I'm so excited 0:01:04.640 --> 0:01:07.960 we're talking about RoboCop today. Did you come up? I 0:01:07.959 --> 0:01:10.360 think I knew you came up with this topic because 0:01:10.360 --> 0:01:14.280 you recently visited some of the original locations featured in 0:01:14.319 --> 0:01:14.759 the movie. 0:01:15.160 --> 0:01:18.479 Yeah. I was on a family trip to Dallas over 0:01:18.840 --> 0:01:22.119 Thanksgiving break. We'd never been before. We went there primarily 0:01:22.160 --> 0:01:23.959 to go to Mao Wolf and then to check out 0:01:24.319 --> 0:01:27.640 various things in the city, museums and you know, restaurants 0:01:27.680 --> 0:01:30.680 and whatnot. And I had honestly kind of forgotten about 0:01:30.680 --> 0:01:34.319 the RoboCop connection until we were there driving around, and 0:01:34.360 --> 0:01:37.280 then I look out the window and I see the 0:01:37.400 --> 0:01:41.080 Dallas City Hall, and then I remember, this is the 0:01:41.200 --> 0:01:44.600 RoboCop building. This is OCP headquarters, or at least the 0:01:44.600 --> 0:01:47.000 lower portion of it. They did a matte painting on 0:01:47.040 --> 0:01:50.600 top of that to make it into this enormous skyscraper 0:01:50.680 --> 0:01:54.400 that reaches up to the heavens. And yeah, and then 0:01:54.560 --> 0:01:58.600 was just generally impressed by the architecture in Dallas. And 0:01:58.680 --> 0:02:01.000 then once I got back, you know, we started looking 0:02:01.040 --> 0:02:03.720 at RoboCop again and was reminded, like just how present 0:02:03.960 --> 0:02:07.840 Dallas is in the background standing in for futuristic Detroit. 0:02:08.280 --> 0:02:11.160 Right, So RoboCop is not actually set in Dallas. It's 0:02:11.160 --> 0:02:14.320 set in near future Detroit at the time the movie 0:02:14.400 --> 0:02:18.320 was made. But some of the architectural landmarks in Dallas 0:02:18.400 --> 0:02:21.679 really communicate the feeling that they were going for in 0:02:22.000 --> 0:02:23.120 the world of RoboCop. 0:02:23.600 --> 0:02:26.360 Yeah, and it's unmistakable even if you're not from Dallas. 0:02:26.520 --> 0:02:29.280 Like there's a car chase earlier in early in the 0:02:29.280 --> 0:02:32.440 film where you see Reunion Tower in the background, which 0:02:32.480 --> 0:02:38.880 is very identifiable structure. It's this concrete pillar, you know, 0:02:39.000 --> 0:02:41.600 jutting up into the sky, and there's a sphere up there. 0:02:42.240 --> 0:02:45.040 It's not a perfect sphere, but you know, observation and 0:02:45.360 --> 0:02:48.320 restaurant deck and my family actually went up there. But 0:02:48.919 --> 0:02:51.000 it's pretty fun, has pretty pretty cool history, like a 0:02:51.000 --> 0:02:53.679 lot of these buildings though, but yeah, it's there in 0:02:53.720 --> 0:02:56.399 the background. Anybody who knows anything about Dallas, or even 0:02:56.440 --> 0:02:59.720 seen the opening to the TV series Dallas, would have 0:02:59.760 --> 0:03:02.079 been able to recognize that this is not Detroit. This 0:03:02.200 --> 0:03:04.880 is Staus but you know, nice stand in lots of neat, 0:03:04.960 --> 0:03:06.440 futuristic looking architecture. 0:03:06.960 --> 0:03:08.960 So when did you first see RoboCop. 0:03:10.240 --> 0:03:12.760 I saw it, like I think a lot of people 0:03:12.800 --> 0:03:16.400 of my generation saw it way too young. I think 0:03:16.639 --> 0:03:19.280 it was playing at a friend's house or kind of 0:03:19.280 --> 0:03:22.760 like friends of the family at their house, and I 0:03:22.880 --> 0:03:24.680 ended up watching part of it. And you know, there's 0:03:24.680 --> 0:03:28.520 plenty there to bring in a young mind, to captivate 0:03:28.560 --> 0:03:31.239 a young mind. You know, a robot fighting crime, firing 0:03:31.280 --> 0:03:34.960 all sorts of crazy guns. But then you know, it's 0:03:35.120 --> 0:03:38.800 kind of a notoriously violent film. It's got some really 0:03:38.800 --> 0:03:42.680 grotesque moments in it, which we'll discuss. It was not 0:03:42.800 --> 0:03:47.200 appropriate viewing at this at whatever age I was, but 0:03:47.480 --> 0:03:50.200 you know, I still loved it, grew to love it, 0:03:50.240 --> 0:03:52.120 and I think a lot of people have this experience. 0:03:53.000 --> 0:03:55.800 Someone I was talking to in the last couple of 0:03:55.880 --> 0:03:59.440 years said that their mom had rented this for them 0:03:59.440 --> 0:04:01.800 at the store when they were young. They were just like, oh, 0:04:01.880 --> 0:04:04.160 they need a film RoboCop. This looks fun. They didn't 0:04:04.200 --> 0:04:06.000 like look at it closely enough to realize it was 0:04:06.080 --> 0:04:11.119 rated R, and then you know, the violence just washes over. 0:04:10.920 --> 0:04:13.480 Them, and probably a lot of the commentary sort of 0:04:13.480 --> 0:04:15.280 went over their heads at that age too. 0:04:15.400 --> 0:04:17.800 Oh yeah, yeah, all that ends up sticking with you 0:04:17.839 --> 0:04:19.760 probably is like the cool robot stuff, and there is 0:04:19.760 --> 0:04:22.640 some really cool robot stuff in this film, the violence 0:04:22.680 --> 0:04:24.440 and probably the profanity. 0:04:24.760 --> 0:04:26.479 So I did a little digging to figure out when 0:04:26.480 --> 0:04:28.480 I first saw RoboCop, and I was able to peg 0:04:28.560 --> 0:04:34.800 it to a year based on a rather a greasy marker, 0:04:35.279 --> 0:04:39.040 so I knew that, and this is also a very 0:04:39.120 --> 0:04:41.680 RoboCop sounding reason to be able to know when I 0:04:41.680 --> 0:04:44.040 saw this. So I first saw it right around the 0:04:44.120 --> 0:04:48.360 debut of The Windy's menu item the Baconator, which would 0:04:48.360 --> 0:04:51.200 place this event in the year two thousand and seven, 0:04:51.680 --> 0:04:53.560 so you know it's two thousand and seven. I was 0:04:53.800 --> 0:04:55.200 I don't know how old I was. I was like 0:04:55.240 --> 0:04:58.120 twenty or so. I was hanging out with some friends 0:04:58.200 --> 0:05:01.000 and somehow it came up in Converse station that first 0:05:01.000 --> 0:05:03.440 of all, I had never seen RoboCop, and second, I 0:05:03.480 --> 0:05:05.960 had not yet had one of the new Bacon Eators, 0:05:06.360 --> 0:05:08.400 and they were like, okay, we've got to fix both. 0:05:08.480 --> 0:05:11.120 So we went to Windy's and then we watched this movie. 0:05:11.760 --> 0:05:15.360 And sorry to the Wendy's fans out there, the bacon Eator, 0:05:15.440 --> 0:05:17.559 at least this one at this time, was not good. 0:05:18.000 --> 0:05:19.760 And I'm not trying to be a food snob. I 0:05:19.839 --> 0:05:22.600 totally admit I can enjoy a greasy fast food sandwich. 0:05:22.920 --> 0:05:25.599 But whatever I got that day was just not right. 0:05:25.720 --> 0:05:28.400 It seemed like it had about eight slices of American 0:05:28.520 --> 0:05:31.800 cheese and like thirty strips of bacon on it. Just 0:05:31.920 --> 0:05:35.120 too much, too much bacon and cheese. Maybe those things 0:05:35.160 --> 0:05:38.080 are different now, I don't know. But on the other hand, 0:05:38.320 --> 0:05:42.920 RoboCop was amazing, and this memory I think sticks with 0:05:42.960 --> 0:05:46.720 me because the bacon eator I had that day came 0:05:46.760 --> 0:05:50.520 to seem like something that you would see an advertisement 0:05:50.600 --> 0:05:54.960 for in RoboCop. It's like an in universe RoboCop food item. 0:05:55.400 --> 0:05:58.200 It's something e Meal would be eating while he's like 0:05:58.240 --> 0:06:00.279 pointing a gun at you and asking if you you 0:06:00.320 --> 0:06:01.679 think you're smarter than a bullet. 0:06:03.320 --> 0:06:07.520 Yeah. Yeah, It's kind of the six thousand Sux of Burgers. 0:06:07.560 --> 0:06:08.240 It sounds like. 0:06:08.800 --> 0:06:11.400 It'll be hilarious if a Windy's ad runs on this episode. 0:06:11.440 --> 0:06:17.600 By the way, So I was struck by how different 0:06:17.680 --> 0:06:22.279 this movie was than I had always assumed because I'd 0:06:22.279 --> 0:06:24.680 never seen RoboCop, but I was aware of it as 0:06:24.760 --> 0:06:28.560 one of these eighties action movies, and I received it 0:06:28.640 --> 0:06:32.320 the way it had been I think, generally culturally metabolized, 0:06:32.360 --> 0:06:36.479 which was totally missing the point of it, shelving it 0:06:36.480 --> 0:06:39.760 alongside these other gory, r rated eighties action movies, maybe 0:06:39.760 --> 0:06:44.080 on the level of Commando starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. That's how 0:06:44.080 --> 0:06:45.640 I thought of what RoboCop was. 0:06:46.120 --> 0:06:48.800 And I think it can leave that kind of impression 0:06:48.880 --> 0:06:52.560 in memory if you're far removed from especially in early 0:06:52.680 --> 0:06:54.880 viewing of the film. I mean, the violence is so 0:06:55.120 --> 0:06:58.919 violent that it kind of sticks with you, and you 0:06:59.000 --> 0:07:00.480 might forget some of the other stuff. Like I was 0:07:00.520 --> 0:07:01.920 talking to my wife about this when I was about 0:07:02.160 --> 0:07:05.120 to rewatch it. She was very, very supporting of me 0:07:05.200 --> 0:07:07.200 watching RoboCop, but did not want to watch it, and 0:07:07.240 --> 0:07:09.200 I had to remind her say, oh no, there's a 0:07:09.240 --> 0:07:11.880 lot of satire in it. There's more to it than 0:07:12.000 --> 0:07:14.720 just the violence. Though the violence is there, and it's 0:07:14.720 --> 0:07:15.920 sticking with you for a reason. 0:07:16.280 --> 0:07:18.080 Yeah, I agree, And at the risk of sounding like 0:07:18.120 --> 0:07:22.480 a sucker, I think RoboCop has a quite genuine soul 0:07:22.600 --> 0:07:26.000 and humanity to it, and amid everything else it is, 0:07:26.040 --> 0:07:29.680 it is a hyper violent action movie, that's true. It 0:07:29.800 --> 0:07:33.200 is a hair raising depiction of a world in the 0:07:33.280 --> 0:07:37.680 hands of a moral egomaniacs. It is also a sort 0:07:37.720 --> 0:07:42.440 of light light sci fi speculation about cybernetics. It is 0:07:42.520 --> 0:07:47.000 definitely a hilarious fun house mirror to American culture. Amid 0:07:47.040 --> 0:07:50.560 all those things, it's about the struggle to keep hold 0:07:50.760 --> 0:07:54.400 of one's own humanity in a situation where there is 0:07:54.600 --> 0:07:59.040 enormous pressure from every direction trying to transform you into 0:07:59.080 --> 0:08:04.040 a soulless mash. So a lot of retrospective appreciation of 0:08:04.160 --> 0:08:09.240 RoboCop mentions the satirical aspects of it. So I think 0:08:09.280 --> 0:08:13.120 you absolutely could look at RoboCop as a satirical vision 0:08:13.480 --> 0:08:16.840 of a dystopian near future from the time that it 0:08:16.920 --> 0:08:18.880 was made, which you know, so the mid to late 0:08:18.960 --> 0:08:23.040 nineteen eighties. And I think one of the main political 0:08:23.120 --> 0:08:25.520 thrusts of the commentary in the movie is if you 0:08:25.520 --> 0:08:27.840 ever heard people say, I wish the country could be 0:08:27.920 --> 0:08:31.800 run like a business. The situational premise of RoboCop is 0:08:31.840 --> 0:08:33.840 to say, Okay, let's see what that would be like. 0:08:34.720 --> 0:08:39.319 So it depicts a kind of privatization nightmare where everything 0:08:39.840 --> 0:08:42.360 that used to be thought of as a public interest 0:08:42.440 --> 0:08:45.800 in a public good is sold off to corporations to 0:08:45.880 --> 0:08:48.720 be run for profit. And though that seems to be 0:08:48.760 --> 0:08:51.720 happening in pretty much all domains in the world of 0:08:51.760 --> 0:08:56.320 the film, RoboCop especially focuses on the police department in 0:08:56.360 --> 0:08:59.160 the city of Detroit, which has been bought out by 0:08:59.240 --> 0:09:04.440 a corporation called Omni Consumer Products or OCP, and OCP 0:09:04.520 --> 0:09:07.280 seems to be using it primarily in a couple of ways. 0:09:07.280 --> 0:09:09.000 You get the sense they're looking at it as a 0:09:09.040 --> 0:09:11.760 cost cutting center, so maybe they're taking the money for 0:09:11.800 --> 0:09:14.040 the contract and then just cutting costs down to the 0:09:14.080 --> 0:09:16.640 bone without regard for how this affects people, and then 0:09:16.679 --> 0:09:19.960 keeping the difference. But they're also using it as a 0:09:20.040 --> 0:09:24.080 playground to test out prototypes of new hardware that is 0:09:24.080 --> 0:09:27.959 eventually destined for military use and thus big Pentagon contracts. 0:09:28.640 --> 0:09:33.480 And the plot of RoboCop essentially arises as a conflict 0:09:33.800 --> 0:09:37.880 between two rival OCP executives. You got Dick Jones and 0:09:37.960 --> 0:09:42.600 Bob Morton who are squabbling to get their respective lethal 0:09:42.760 --> 0:09:46.560 robot projects online at the police department so they can 0:09:46.600 --> 0:09:51.720 eventually step them up, scale them up, and secure defense dollars. 0:09:51.240 --> 0:09:54.240 So the things that are happening in the movie are 0:09:54.240 --> 0:09:57.319 happening because of what's going on at the corporate board level. 0:09:57.360 --> 0:10:00.880 These characters squabbling to get their own pros online and 0:10:00.920 --> 0:10:03.800 make bank off of that. And meanwhile, the main good 0:10:03.920 --> 0:10:07.680 characters are essentially just street level cops who are unknown 0:10:07.720 --> 0:10:11.440 and unimportant to these power players, but whose fates are 0:10:11.440 --> 0:10:12.880 controlled thereby. 0:10:14.040 --> 0:10:16.240 Yeah. Yeah, I mean, they're just struggling trying to do 0:10:16.280 --> 0:10:21.199 their job. Also, you know, there's talk of unionization. There 0:10:21.360 --> 0:10:24.800 are all these other additional elements that are in play 0:10:25.440 --> 0:10:28.400 kind of at the street level, but OCP is not 0:10:28.440 --> 0:10:31.760 at street level. They're they're they're halfway to heaven in 0:10:31.840 --> 0:10:36.679 their enormous skyscraper, and yeah, that's where that's where a 0:10:36.720 --> 0:10:38.520 lot of the plotting and a lot of and ultimately 0:10:38.520 --> 0:10:39.720 a lot of the action goes down. 0:10:40.000 --> 0:10:42.360 That's right. So I thought RoboCop was great when I 0:10:42.400 --> 0:10:44.800 first watched it. I've seen it several times over the 0:10:44.880 --> 0:10:47.960 year since then. I've long had an appreciation of it, 0:10:48.280 --> 0:10:50.600 but most recently, when I watched it just this week, 0:10:50.640 --> 0:10:53.360 I sort of think it's better than ever. And one 0:10:53.400 --> 0:10:57.160 thing that struck me on the most recent viewing is that, 0:10:57.920 --> 0:11:00.560 in a way, I think the sort of police criminal 0:11:00.720 --> 0:11:04.480 justice themes are less essential to the spirit of the 0:11:04.520 --> 0:11:07.600 movie then a lot of people would think, and certainly 0:11:07.640 --> 0:11:10.120 than I once thought. So, Like, the characters are cops 0:11:10.840 --> 0:11:14.000 and some of the villains are career criminals, but they 0:11:14.040 --> 0:11:17.600 could be in any line of work of what used 0:11:17.600 --> 0:11:20.960 to be public service sector jobs, and the spirit of 0:11:20.960 --> 0:11:22.680 the movie would be similar, though I guess it would 0:11:22.679 --> 0:11:25.280 be a lot less high octane if this was about 0:11:25.280 --> 0:11:28.440 like librarians whose branch is bought out by OCP and 0:11:28.480 --> 0:11:30.960 they want to replace all the books with advertisements for 0:11:31.000 --> 0:11:35.120 the new six thousand SUX. But I think the deepest idea, 0:11:35.200 --> 0:11:37.080 like what's at the heart of this movie is that 0:11:37.120 --> 0:11:40.440 it's about people who are doing a job, whatever that 0:11:40.559 --> 0:11:43.120 job is, where their bosses do not see them as 0:11:43.200 --> 0:11:47.640 human beings. They are treated like inanimate tools or machines 0:11:48.240 --> 0:11:52.640 just to be used to their maximum value, exhausted and discarded. 0:11:53.160 --> 0:11:57.080 And this metaphor is literalized in the case of RoboCop himself, 0:11:57.480 --> 0:12:01.480 and his redemption is in read discovering and reasserting that 0:12:01.520 --> 0:12:04.840 he is a human being, not just a mechanism to 0:12:04.920 --> 0:12:07.200 be used for profit by somebody else. 0:12:07.760 --> 0:12:10.360 Yeah. Yeah, his rediscovery of his humanity, that he is 0:12:10.400 --> 0:12:13.839 a human and not a product. Yeah, I very much 0:12:13.880 --> 0:12:18.280 agree with just the how good the movie is. Like basically, 0:12:18.559 --> 0:12:22.679 RoboCop shouldn't be this good as I rewatch it in 0:12:22.720 --> 0:12:25.600 my mid forties here, you know, because it's a film 0:12:25.640 --> 0:12:29.040 that again terrified and enthralled me when I was at 0:12:29.040 --> 0:12:32.080 a way too early age, entertained me later on, you know, 0:12:32.120 --> 0:12:34.640 as a solid, you know, kind of dystopian action movie 0:12:34.760 --> 0:12:38.839 with some laughs thrown in. But yeah, it absolutely delivers satirically, 0:12:39.840 --> 0:12:43.400 It delivers with the action, and you know, it delivers emotionally, 0:12:43.559 --> 0:12:48.000 like when the film really gets into its its own 0:12:48.040 --> 0:12:52.560 emotional depth, I felt like those moments still hit pretty hard, 0:12:52.880 --> 0:12:54.800 or I mean actually hit harder than they ever had 0:12:54.840 --> 0:12:58.560 because you know, I, for instance, Murphy's son in the 0:12:58.559 --> 0:13:01.800 film is about the age of my own, so it's 0:13:02.120 --> 0:13:03.880 that resonated in a way that he just wasn't going 0:13:03.920 --> 0:13:06.600 to resonate with me when I was a kid. And then, 0:13:06.600 --> 0:13:08.480 of course all of this on top of the expected 0:13:08.520 --> 0:13:11.280 nostalgia rush of watching a film like this that for 0:13:11.360 --> 0:13:12.560 better or where she grew up with. 0:13:12.800 --> 0:13:15.480 Yeah, totally, So I see all that, and at the 0:13:15.480 --> 0:13:18.840 same time, I accept RoboCop is probably not for everybody. 0:13:18.880 --> 0:13:23.720 This is, to be clear, a hard R rated, hyper 0:13:23.840 --> 0:13:26.839 violent film, So you've got to be in the I 0:13:26.840 --> 0:13:29.120 don't know, in the right headspace to accept it. But 0:13:29.679 --> 0:13:32.959 if it is on a wavelength that is amenable to you, 0:13:33.360 --> 0:13:34.920 I think it is excellent. 0:13:35.480 --> 0:13:38.240 All right, Joe, what's your elevator pitch for RoboCop? 0:13:38.240 --> 0:13:42.320 Then Omni Consumer Products has bought out the contract for 0:13:42.360 --> 0:13:45.560 Old Detroit and wants to replace its human police force 0:13:45.920 --> 0:13:49.280 with one of a selection of different gun wielding robots. 0:13:49.800 --> 0:13:52.520 Beat Cop Alex Murphy is killed on the job, and 0:13:52.559 --> 0:13:56.400 his body parts, including the remains of his damaged brain, 0:13:57.000 --> 0:14:00.320 are used as scaffolding for one of these projects X. 0:14:00.559 --> 0:14:05.199 A cyborg called RoboCop. Is he simply a tool now 0:14:05.200 --> 0:14:08.800 controlled in full by his corporate masters or is there 0:14:08.880 --> 0:14:11.200 still a human being inside who can act of his 0:14:11.240 --> 0:14:11.960 own free will? 0:14:12.520 --> 0:14:19.160 All right, let's listen to that Trailorati Old Detroit has 0:14:19.160 --> 0:14:27.240 a cancer. Cancer is crime. We need a self sufficient 0:14:27.280 --> 0:14:29.720 law enforcement robot. How long will it take? 0:14:29.840 --> 0:14:33.960 We can go to prototype within ninety days. Where are 0:14:33.960 --> 0:14:35.240 you from? Stroud? 0:14:35.520 --> 0:14:36.560 Welcome to Hell. 0:14:39.920 --> 0:14:40.360 Alive. 0:14:40.480 --> 0:14:57.560 You're coming with me. You're gonna be a bad mothers. 0:15:00.480 --> 0:15:04.880 Yes, man, this guy's really good machine. Robo cop? What 0:15:05.160 --> 0:15:05.360 is he? 0:15:05.560 --> 0:15:06.360 He's a cyborg? 0:15:06.400 --> 0:15:07.680 You idiot? All hero? 0:15:08.040 --> 0:15:13.640 What are your prime directors protect to innocent? Let the 0:15:13.760 --> 0:15:16.160 woman go or there will be trouble. 0:15:17.480 --> 0:15:18.120 Hold the law. 0:15:18.520 --> 0:15:19.680 You are under arrest. 0:15:22.720 --> 0:15:38.239 Justice gets an upgrade looking for me, your great RoboCop. 0:15:38.360 --> 0:15:46.080 Thank you for your cooperation. Good night. All right. Well, 0:15:46.120 --> 0:15:48.320 if you want to go out and watch RoboCop before 0:15:48.320 --> 0:15:51.200 proceeding with the rest of the episode, go for it. 0:15:51.200 --> 0:15:55.160 It's widely available as a physical or digital release. Joe, 0:15:55.240 --> 0:15:58.640 you watched it on the older Criterion Collection DVD, which 0:15:58.680 --> 0:16:00.800 I understand it's pretty awesome. I watched it on the 0:16:00.920 --> 0:16:04.760 Aero Blu ray which I ran from Videodrome, which I 0:16:04.800 --> 0:16:06.920 really loved. Both are loaded with extras. 0:16:07.080 --> 0:16:09.160 I think I got to upgrade my disc because my 0:16:09.200 --> 0:16:12.760 old DVD now is playing in a rectangle inside my 0:16:12.880 --> 0:16:18.040 TV screen. But nevertheless, yeah, it was a great rewatch. 0:16:26.360 --> 0:16:29.400 All right. Let's get into the people involved in this production, 0:16:29.640 --> 0:16:34.680 starting at the top with the director. Paul Verhooven born 0:16:34.760 --> 0:16:38.600 nineteen thirty eight, Dutch director, best known internationally for his 0:16:38.640 --> 0:16:41.800 string of major Hollywood genre films of the eighties and nineties. 0:16:42.520 --> 0:16:46.160 This is our first Rehoven film. He started out in 0:16:46.240 --> 0:16:49.640 Dutch cinema and his first full length feature was the 0:16:49.720 --> 0:16:53.400 nineteen seventy one comedy Business Is Business, followed by seventy 0:16:53.400 --> 0:16:56.920 three's Turkish Delight. That's his first collaboration with fellow Dutchman 0:16:57.040 --> 0:17:01.120 Rutger Howard in his film debut. This was an erotic 0:17:01.280 --> 0:17:04.480 drama and the film was a critical success and received 0:17:04.480 --> 0:17:07.320 a Best Foreign Language Film nomination at the nineteen seventy 0:17:07.320 --> 0:17:10.959 four Oscars. He did three additional Dutch films with Howard 0:17:11.080 --> 0:17:13.840 and a nineteen eighty three thriller called The Fourth Man 0:17:14.280 --> 0:17:18.439 with the Jerome Krabby, another Dutch actor of note that 0:17:18.480 --> 0:17:21.240 he had frequently worked with, that went on to international success. 0:17:21.920 --> 0:17:25.760 After this, he transitioned to Hollywood with the Rudger Howard 0:17:25.840 --> 0:17:30.119 heilmed nineteen eighty five medieval action adventure film Flesh and 0:17:30.200 --> 0:17:34.040 Blood or It's actually the title often looks like flesh plus. 0:17:33.760 --> 0:17:35.800 Blood equals what. 0:17:37.600 --> 0:17:42.239 Cinema I guess. And then then comes RoboCop, which was 0:17:42.400 --> 0:17:45.080 a big enough hit, though at the time criticized for 0:17:45.080 --> 0:17:47.800 his violence, certainly that He went on to direct Total 0:17:47.840 --> 0:17:51.560 Recall in nineteen ninety, Basic Instinct in ninety two, Showgirls 0:17:51.600 --> 0:17:55.560 in ninety five, Starship Troopers in ninety seven, and Hollow 0:17:55.600 --> 0:18:02.800 Man in two thousand, which was apparently an unsatisfying film Forhoven. 0:18:03.000 --> 0:18:05.119 It seems in interviews where he's like, well, this was 0:18:05.160 --> 0:18:07.520 the first movie that I made that looking at it, 0:18:07.600 --> 0:18:09.359 someone else could have made it. You know. He didn't 0:18:09.359 --> 0:18:12.240 feel like his touch was there. So after this he 0:18:12.280 --> 0:18:14.560 moved back to Dutch cinema with a string of pictures 0:18:14.560 --> 0:18:17.760 that lean more historical in theme less sci fi and 0:18:17.800 --> 0:18:20.320 so forth. But I believe he is set to return 0:18:20.359 --> 0:18:23.120 to American cinema with a project called Young Sinner, which 0:18:23.160 --> 0:18:24.200 is currently in development. 0:18:24.640 --> 0:18:27.920 Yeah, regarding his other big Hollywood movies, it is a 0:18:27.960 --> 0:18:30.879 weird string of films, though you can totally see the 0:18:31.520 --> 0:18:35.000 as different as they are the creative threads that run 0:18:35.040 --> 0:18:37.120 through them, and I would say the thing that they 0:18:37.160 --> 0:18:40.520 all have in common is excess. He was a filmmaker 0:18:40.560 --> 0:18:46.159 who was into depicting depicting a kind of carnal excess 0:18:46.240 --> 0:18:50.840 in terms of sex and violence, but usually to make 0:18:50.880 --> 0:18:54.199 a point of some kind. Whether he was successful or 0:18:54.240 --> 0:18:57.159 not in all of these endeavors, that's questionable. 0:18:57.200 --> 0:18:57.320 Though. 0:18:57.359 --> 0:18:59.760 I think I would single out Starship Troopers in ninety 0:18:59.800 --> 0:19:03.320 seven and as another movie that I think at the 0:19:03.440 --> 0:19:06.399 time a lot of people really did not get it, 0:19:06.840 --> 0:19:08.560 kind of like what happened with RoboCop. A lot of 0:19:08.560 --> 0:19:12.080 people saw it as a kind of excessive, mindless, hyper 0:19:12.200 --> 0:19:15.679 violent sci fi action movie that in retrospect a lot 0:19:15.720 --> 0:19:17.720 of critics have looked back and said, this is actually 0:19:17.840 --> 0:19:22.119 a quite sharp satire and works much better than we 0:19:22.200 --> 0:19:23.320 originally realized. 0:19:24.000 --> 0:19:25.800 Yeah, I still need to go back and rewatch it, 0:19:25.840 --> 0:19:28.200 because I watched it when I was when it first 0:19:28.280 --> 0:19:31.119 came out. I just didn't pick up on all the satire, 0:19:31.240 --> 0:19:36.160 and so the fascist themes in there that are there intentionally, 0:19:36.200 --> 0:19:40.000 that are being satirized just ended up sitting with me 0:19:40.160 --> 0:19:42.000 in a very weird way. I was like, I really 0:19:42.080 --> 0:19:45.760 don't like the humans in this, and of course I 0:19:45.760 --> 0:19:48.600 don't think you're supposed to like the humans at least 0:19:48.800 --> 0:19:50.800 by the end of the film, so I need to 0:19:50.800 --> 0:19:54.000 revisit it at some point. Now. Rahuvein was apparently I've 0:19:54.040 --> 0:19:57.720 read slow to accept the RoboCop project, apparently because he 0:19:57.800 --> 0:20:00.560 didn't really understand the satire at first. And I think 0:20:00.800 --> 0:20:03.600 it's been said that his wife likes like like set 0:20:03.680 --> 0:20:05.359 him down, was like, no, no, no, see this is what 0:20:05.400 --> 0:20:07.760 it's don't you see what it's doing here? And then 0:20:07.760 --> 0:20:10.439 he was like, Okay, yeah, I see now. And I 0:20:10.480 --> 0:20:12.600 wonder how much of that has to do with the excess, 0:20:12.640 --> 0:20:15.760 you know, because it's like he seems like a filmmaker, 0:20:15.840 --> 0:20:20.240 you know, who is about pushing for the excessive violence 0:20:20.320 --> 0:20:23.080 and or sexuality more the violence in this film, but 0:20:23.119 --> 0:20:26.840 also pushing the satire, like making sure that everything's ramped 0:20:26.920 --> 0:20:30.879 up enough that you can't miss it, that even at 0:20:30.960 --> 0:20:34.400 least subconsciously, it's going to needle your brain and make 0:20:34.440 --> 0:20:37.280 you realize something's not right here, or something's being said. 0:20:37.800 --> 0:20:40.240 There's some additional way I'm supposed to interpret this. 0:20:40.760 --> 0:20:43.719 Yeah, though, like I said, I mean, I think, especially 0:20:43.760 --> 0:20:45.639 in the case of Starship Troopers, it seems like a 0:20:45.640 --> 0:20:47.399 lot of people did miss it at the time and 0:20:47.880 --> 0:20:49.880 only got it years later looking back. 0:20:50.400 --> 0:20:53.280 Yeah. Now, the writers on this we have. We have 0:20:53.280 --> 0:20:58.000 two writers. There's Edward Neumeyer, American screenwriter, producer, and director. 0:20:58.080 --> 0:21:02.000 This was his first big hit alongside Michael Minor, who 0:21:02.040 --> 0:21:03.800 will get to in a second. He went on to 0:21:03.800 --> 0:21:07.720 work on Starship Troopers, Starship Troopers two, and Starship Troopers three, 0:21:07.800 --> 0:21:12.320 which he directed. He also co scripted Anaconda's The Hunt 0:21:12.320 --> 0:21:16.280 for the Blood Orchid in two thousand and four, and 0:21:16.560 --> 0:21:19.840 he's actually the writer of the upcoming Young Center project 0:21:19.840 --> 0:21:21.199 that I referenced earlier. 0:21:21.880 --> 0:21:25.040 I have not seen the Starship Troopers sequels, but ooh boy, 0:21:25.119 --> 0:21:27.560 that just sounds like I don't know, reaching into a 0:21:27.560 --> 0:21:31.520 snake hole in the woods. I don't know if that 0:21:31.640 --> 0:21:34.240 was Maybe maybe they're great. 0:21:34.320 --> 0:21:37.760 I haven't seen him now. As for Michael Minor, also 0:21:37.880 --> 0:21:41.200 director and screenwriter of various projects, this was his first 0:21:41.200 --> 0:21:42.879 big hit as well, which you followed up with with 0:21:42.960 --> 0:21:45.480 script work on nineteen eighty nine's Deadly Weapon, which he 0:21:45.520 --> 0:21:51.680 also directed lawnmower Man two, and also Anaconda's The Hunt 0:21:51.680 --> 0:21:54.720 for the Blood Orchid. He also directed nineteen ninety nine's 0:21:54.720 --> 0:21:57.560 The Book of Stars, which looks like I got some 0:21:57.600 --> 0:22:00.240 good reviews. I think it's more of a drama. In 0:22:00.280 --> 0:22:02.399 his career, he directed a number of music videos for 0:22:02.440 --> 0:22:03.879 the rock band Y and T. 0:22:04.720 --> 0:22:05.920 I don't think I know them. 0:22:06.240 --> 0:22:07.560 I was not familiar. Look like some sort of a 0:22:07.640 --> 0:22:10.600 rock band or metal band, but I just don't know. Now. 0:22:10.840 --> 0:22:13.320 Our star of this is, of course, Peter Weller, playing 0:22:14.080 --> 0:22:16.919 essentially a dual role Alex Murphy and then the RoboCop 0:22:16.960 --> 0:22:20.639 that Murphy becomes, and then Robocop's attempts to reconnect with 0:22:20.680 --> 0:22:23.680 the Alex Murphy he once was. Weller was born in 0:22:23.760 --> 0:22:26.920 nineteen forty seven American actor and director who's acting work 0:22:27.000 --> 0:22:29.879 goes back to the early seventies and he's still active today. 0:22:29.920 --> 0:22:32.880 We previously discussed him in more depth in our episode 0:22:32.920 --> 0:22:34.560 on panoscos Monto's The Viewing. 0:22:35.000 --> 0:22:37.040 As we go on to discuss Weller in this role, 0:22:37.359 --> 0:22:39.600 a point of comparison that I think is maybe worth 0:22:39.680 --> 0:22:44.040 making is to the actors who play Batman, where there's 0:22:44.119 --> 0:22:45.960 a dual role where there's like, you know, you have 0:22:46.040 --> 0:22:48.520 your face revealed in one sense as Bruce Wayne, but 0:22:48.560 --> 0:22:51.040 then also for part of the movie, you are just 0:22:51.119 --> 0:22:51.960 a mouth and chin. 0:22:53.240 --> 0:22:56.400 Yeah. So you know, luckily Peter Weller has a very 0:22:56.400 --> 0:23:00.680 handsome mouth and chin, very expressive. I think the other 0:23:00.720 --> 0:23:04.480 interesting thing that that was surely intentional is that, especially 0:23:04.480 --> 0:23:07.480 at the time, he was a very gaunt actor, you know, 0:23:07.640 --> 0:23:10.720 a very thin man, which you know, you need a 0:23:10.760 --> 0:23:12.879 skeleton to go at the in the middle of all 0:23:12.920 --> 0:23:16.159 of that gear that he ends up wearing in the 0:23:16.240 --> 0:23:19.840 RoboCop suit. So I think that that probably was a 0:23:19.920 --> 0:23:22.440 huge factor as well. You need somebody that can literally 0:23:22.440 --> 0:23:25.720 be the skeleton of this thing. Now. As Murphy, I 0:23:26.160 --> 0:23:28.359 you know, he's basically just a likable good cop that 0:23:28.400 --> 0:23:30.399 we don't really get to know all that much. We 0:23:30.480 --> 0:23:33.199 learn more about him through RoboCop as he tries to 0:23:33.240 --> 0:23:36.600 reconnect with his past, and this results in various moments 0:23:36.640 --> 0:23:41.359 where RoboCop the cyborg is trying to connect with the 0:23:41.359 --> 0:23:44.000 remnants of his own humanity, you know, and his memories 0:23:44.040 --> 0:23:46.960 of his family, and I think Weller does a really 0:23:47.000 --> 0:23:50.560 great job in those moments, like they I kind of 0:23:51.040 --> 0:23:55.520 weld some tears up in those moments myself, and and 0:23:55.680 --> 0:23:58.199 and then also just as in terms of you know, 0:23:58.280 --> 0:24:01.639 the action scenes, I think it's a very nice physical performance. 0:24:01.680 --> 0:24:05.040 So there are certainly times where the robot movements look silly, 0:24:05.400 --> 0:24:08.320 you know, walking around as RoboCop, and I think maybe 0:24:08.320 --> 0:24:10.920 they're supposed to, but there are also some great flourishes 0:24:10.960 --> 0:24:13.920 that really bring this metallic hulk to life. I think 0:24:13.920 --> 0:24:16.480 about the way that he positions his hands when he's 0:24:16.480 --> 0:24:19.600 firing that enormous pistol of his I don't know if 0:24:20.040 --> 0:24:24.840 this is something that actually makes sense in the use 0:24:24.880 --> 0:24:27.600 of a pistol, but it looks really good when RoboCop 0:24:27.680 --> 0:24:27.960 does it. 0:24:28.400 --> 0:24:31.240 Well, there's a strange kind of ballet to the way 0:24:31.240 --> 0:24:34.000 that he moves, Like he doesn't just raise his arm 0:24:34.080 --> 0:24:38.040 to shoot his RoboCop gun, if you know what I mean. 0:24:38.119 --> 0:24:40.040 Rob there are some shots where he can almost kind 0:24:40.040 --> 0:24:42.760 of like he raises both arms, like he raises his 0:24:42.880 --> 0:24:45.119 other arm as a kind of counterbalance. Is that what 0:24:45.160 --> 0:24:45.919 you're talking about? 0:24:46.119 --> 0:24:48.960 Yeah, Yeah, it does feel very mechanical like this, like 0:24:49.040 --> 0:24:52.600 his upper torso is the turret of a tank, you know. 0:24:52.720 --> 0:24:56.440 Yeah, but also so I see, Yeah, it is mechanical 0:24:56.560 --> 0:24:59.560 and it almost looks like he's doing a counterweight or counterbalance, 0:24:59.600 --> 0:25:01.639 but it all so kind of looks like a dance, 0:25:01.800 --> 0:25:04.400 like it like ballet or something where the arms both 0:25:04.440 --> 0:25:04.840 go out. 0:25:05.440 --> 0:25:07.800 Yeah. If they had not done those things, I think 0:25:07.920 --> 0:25:12.240 RoboCop the character would have been a lot more just 0:25:12.359 --> 0:25:16.399 visually unappealing. So I was noticing a lot of that 0:25:16.480 --> 0:25:19.320 and rewatching the film. Now. Weller came back to play 0:25:19.960 --> 0:25:24.280 RoboCop again in the sequel RoboCop two, but by RoboCop three, 0:25:24.320 --> 0:25:26.600 he was played by a different actor, Robert John Burke 0:25:26.840 --> 0:25:31.160 of best known probably for Thinner and Dust Devil. I'm 0:25:31.160 --> 0:25:33.800 to understand that Weller was unavailable because he was filming 0:25:33.840 --> 0:25:35.720 Cronenberg's Naked Lunch at that point. 0:25:36.680 --> 0:25:41.119 You know, I've never so RoboCop two is interesting. It 0:25:41.400 --> 0:25:44.440 I think it is quite good, but it's very different 0:25:44.560 --> 0:25:48.560 than the first RoboCop and has a different kind of mindset. 0:25:48.840 --> 0:25:52.199 RoboCop three I've never seen, but it's on paper seems 0:25:52.240 --> 0:25:54.640 like it could be hilarious, so I kind of want 0:25:54.680 --> 0:25:55.800 to get into it. 0:25:55.800 --> 0:25:58.800 It has a great cast, and it's and it's interesting 0:25:58.840 --> 0:26:01.840 too in that by three they're like, you know, kids 0:26:01.880 --> 0:26:06.639 love RoboCop, let's maybe let's make one that's not rated R. 0:26:07.680 --> 0:26:09.640 And so that's what they did. But yeah, I've never 0:26:09.760 --> 0:26:12.359 I've never seen it, but I would like to love 0:26:12.440 --> 0:26:16.439 RoboCup too. It really ups the ante, especially on the 0:26:16.560 --> 0:26:17.920 stop motion violence. 0:26:18.240 --> 0:26:21.200 Yeah, so three has. What I know about it is 0:26:21.240 --> 0:26:24.960 that I think it has rocket ninjas and it is no, 0:26:25.560 --> 0:26:27.159 its reputation is quite terrible. 0:26:27.600 --> 0:26:29.840 Yeah, but it has Stephen Root in it. So it's 0:26:29.920 --> 0:26:32.800 kind of got to apply to Stephen Root rule. How 0:26:32.840 --> 0:26:35.040 bad could it be if Stephen Root isn't it. I 0:26:35.040 --> 0:26:38.800 should also note that Weller has returned to voice RoboCop 0:26:39.000 --> 0:26:41.880 in recent years. I believe they put the character into 0:26:41.880 --> 0:26:44.400 one of the Mortal Kombat games. And there's a new 0:26:44.800 --> 0:26:49.240 RoboCop video game that I am not technologically equipped to play, 0:26:49.800 --> 0:26:52.000 but I've read some interesting things about it. Sounds like 0:26:52.040 --> 0:26:54.280 it does an interesting job of sort of drawing from 0:26:54.280 --> 0:26:58.920 all three films to create a like a fourth narrative 0:26:58.960 --> 0:27:01.919 that you can play through. I don't know that the 0:27:02.000 --> 0:27:05.240 satire is there. So if you've played this new RoboCop 0:27:05.320 --> 0:27:08.800 game right in and tell us what you think, all right. 0:27:09.440 --> 0:27:13.119 The next actor of note is Nancy Allen, playing the cop. 0:27:13.280 --> 0:27:17.399 Anne Lewis born nineteen fifty American actress who kicked off 0:27:17.440 --> 0:27:20.280 her film career in nineteen seventy three is the last detail. 0:27:20.880 --> 0:27:23.040 She followed this up with supporting roles in a string 0:27:23.080 --> 0:27:26.760 of horror movies, including seventy six Is Carrie, then a 0:27:26.760 --> 0:27:28.880 string of roles in films of the films of Brian 0:27:28.960 --> 0:27:32.119 de Palma, seventy nine's Home Movies, nineteen eighties, Dressed to 0:27:32.200 --> 0:27:36.320 Kill and eighty one's Blowout. After RoboCop, she appeared in 0:27:36.400 --> 0:27:39.840 both robo sequels. She was in Poltergeist three in eighty eight, 0:27:40.119 --> 0:27:41.920 she was in nineteen ninety eight s Out of Sight, 0:27:42.760 --> 0:27:45.000 She was in Children of the Corn six six six, 0:27:45.080 --> 0:27:48.639 Isaac's Return in nineteen ninety nine, and her last acting 0:27:48.680 --> 0:27:51.760 credit was in two thousand and eight, So it sounds 0:27:51.760 --> 0:27:55.360 like maybe she sort of quietly retired from cinema. 0:27:55.520 --> 0:27:58.040 Is Children of the Corn six six six, the six 0:27:58.119 --> 0:28:00.679 hundred and sixty six movie in that series. 0:28:02.760 --> 0:28:04.680 It might be I feel like there are that many 0:28:04.720 --> 0:28:07.600 of them. I've attempted to look. I don't think I've 0:28:07.640 --> 0:28:11.119 ever seen one I love Stephen King's original short story. 0:28:11.119 --> 0:28:14.359 It's very creepy, but it's hard to figure out where 0:28:14.359 --> 0:28:18.040 to even contemplate. Beginning with the Children of the Corn movies. 0:28:18.160 --> 0:28:21.560 Why would it take Isaac that long to return, I 0:28:21.600 --> 0:28:21.919 don't know. 0:28:21.960 --> 0:28:23.640 I think maybe he was out for a movie or two. 0:28:23.760 --> 0:28:24.159 I don't know. 0:28:24.200 --> 0:28:29.879 Okay, So I really really love Nancy Allen as Lewis 0:28:29.880 --> 0:28:33.240 and RoboCop. Maybe my all time favorite buddy cop partner 0:28:33.760 --> 0:28:38.080 in a buddy cop movie. So the movie shows kind 0:28:38.080 --> 0:28:41.080 of multiple ways that the police characters react to the 0:28:41.960 --> 0:28:45.600 pressures that they're under in this plot. You know, some 0:28:45.760 --> 0:28:49.440 of the cops in the movie just become unthinking functionaries 0:28:49.440 --> 0:28:52.800 of OCP, Like they just keep their heads down, do 0:28:52.880 --> 0:28:55.120 what the boss says. They don't ask questions, even when 0:28:55.160 --> 0:28:58.640 they are essentially ordered to assassinate RoboCop later in the movie. 0:28:59.120 --> 0:29:02.120 Others are showing how emotional crises, like there's one guy 0:29:02.200 --> 0:29:05.040 who just always in every scene seems to be freaking out. 0:29:06.240 --> 0:29:10.240 Lewis is an interesting like she she keeps cool under pressure, 0:29:10.320 --> 0:29:13.640 and she thinks for herself and she uses compassion. She's 0:29:13.680 --> 0:29:16.400 the one who's able to understand what's going on to 0:29:16.440 --> 0:29:20.640 see that RoboCop is actually Murphy when she gets in 0:29:20.680 --> 0:29:24.440 his face and says, it's you Murphy. Yeah, and to 0:29:24.520 --> 0:29:26.800 see that there's some part of him that is still human, 0:29:26.840 --> 0:29:28.880 and to save his life when Dick Jones is trying 0:29:28.920 --> 0:29:31.320 to have him destroyed in the in the third act 0:29:31.400 --> 0:29:33.440 or second or third, I don't know, later on in 0:29:33.440 --> 0:29:36.480 the movie. And I think Nancy Allen does a great 0:29:36.680 --> 0:29:40.160 job with this role. She's she's tough, down to earth, 0:29:40.600 --> 0:29:43.680 plays it smart human. I really like her in this role. 0:29:44.200 --> 0:29:47.560 Oh yeah, she's really the heart and soul of this 0:29:47.680 --> 0:29:50.040 movie in many ways, in a very real sense and 0:29:50.080 --> 0:29:53.120 an intentional sense, you know. And she's and it's also 0:29:53.120 --> 0:29:56.000 great that she's she's not written as a love interest. Yeah, 0:29:56.040 --> 0:29:58.040 you know, she's a capable action hero in her own 0:29:58.160 --> 0:30:01.640 right in an action movie, but her compassion is really 0:30:01.640 --> 0:30:04.720 her main strength. And that's and without her, if you 0:30:04.760 --> 0:30:08.040 take her character out of this, you don't get any 0:30:08.120 --> 0:30:10.760 kind of a positive resolution for the characters in the setting. 0:30:11.160 --> 0:30:11.600 I agree. 0:30:11.640 --> 0:30:13.640 I think a lesser movie would have tried to have 0:30:13.680 --> 0:30:16.440 some kind of romantic relationship between the two and it 0:30:16.600 --> 0:30:19.440 just that's not what this relationship is about. And I'm 0:30:19.440 --> 0:30:20.719 glad they didn't go that direction. 0:30:21.680 --> 0:30:26.600 I watched a featurette on the Arrow Blu Ray where 0:30:26.600 --> 0:30:30.720 they're interviewing her about this role, and Nancy Allen does 0:30:30.760 --> 0:30:33.000 point out it's very interesting how she ended up getting 0:30:33.160 --> 0:30:35.640 the part, and you know, the sort of callback experience 0:30:35.640 --> 0:30:37.920 and so forth. But she said she showed up in 0:30:38.040 --> 0:30:40.120 Dallas and they were like, how about a shorter haircut, 0:30:40.200 --> 0:30:42.440 and because she had longer hair, and she's like, Okay, 0:30:42.840 --> 0:30:44.760 goes out gets her haircut, and then she's like, oh 0:30:44.800 --> 0:30:47.680 my god, I got my haircut way too short. I've 0:30:47.720 --> 0:30:50.120 got a terrible haircut for this movie. I don't think 0:30:50.120 --> 0:30:53.600 it looks terrible, but it is very short. So it's 0:30:53.640 --> 0:30:56.880 interesting to think about that. Looking at the character, I 0:30:56.920 --> 0:30:59.880 think it ultimately works really well for the character. But 0:31:00.040 --> 0:31:01.760 at the time I think she was a little horrified. 0:31:01.800 --> 0:31:03.240 She was like, I think I've gone too far. 0:31:03.720 --> 0:31:05.640 I think this was the first movie I saw Nancy 0:31:05.680 --> 0:31:07.600 Allen in, so I just think of this as her 0:31:07.680 --> 0:31:09.760 natural haircuts. When I see her in other stuff with 0:31:09.800 --> 0:31:11.640 longer hair, I'm like, oh, here she has long hair. 0:31:11.680 --> 0:31:15.000 Now, all right, let's get into some of the corporate 0:31:15.080 --> 0:31:17.360 characters here. We'll also come back to a few cops. 0:31:17.960 --> 0:31:20.880 This is. We've talked about this actor before, but Dan 0:31:20.960 --> 0:31:23.160 o'hurlehey plays the Old Man. 0:31:24.440 --> 0:31:27.880 Oh boy, the villain from Halloween three shows up as 0:31:27.920 --> 0:31:30.600 a I don't know, is he a villain? And yeah, 0:31:30.840 --> 0:31:34.040 he's a sort of unwitting villain in this movie. You 0:31:34.080 --> 0:31:37.920 don't see him. He's not as direct of a schemer 0:31:37.960 --> 0:31:40.120 as some of the other corporate villains. He's more just 0:31:40.200 --> 0:31:42.880 kind of like sitting there presiding over all of the 0:31:42.920 --> 0:31:45.560 wickedness that goes on, mostly oblivious to it. 0:31:46.240 --> 0:31:48.520 I you know, going into this, and perhaps the character 0:31:48.600 --> 0:31:51.360 changes a bit in the sequels, I don't remember. I've 0:31:51.360 --> 0:31:53.280 probably seen Rebel Coop two more than I've seen any 0:31:53.320 --> 0:31:55.480 of them, so maybe he's more of a villain in too. 0:31:55.560 --> 0:31:58.640 But in this one, I feel like he is essentially 0:31:59.480 --> 0:32:03.920 God or perhaps Zeus. You know, he's The corporate meeting 0:32:03.960 --> 0:32:07.400 rooms of OCP are in a place where skyscrapers touch 0:32:07.480 --> 0:32:10.719 the heavens, and his appearance at a meeting is spoken 0:32:10.760 --> 0:32:13.280 of in terms of a holy visitation, and we never 0:32:13.280 --> 0:32:15.960 hear his name. He's just the old Man. It really 0:32:15.960 --> 0:32:19.680 does feel like he actually comes down for these meetings 0:32:19.680 --> 0:32:23.160 from heaven or from Mount Olympus, carrying with him the 0:32:23.200 --> 0:32:26.560 aloofness and distance of a divine father who wants the 0:32:26.560 --> 0:32:29.200 best for his creations. He wants to create Delta City. 0:32:29.280 --> 0:32:33.360 Remember he's the idea man. All this robot cop stuff 0:32:33.680 --> 0:32:36.600 is just in service to this grand dream that is 0:32:36.600 --> 0:32:39.080 going to make the world better at least for some people. 0:32:40.440 --> 0:32:42.760 He wants to fix his creation, but he doesn't really 0:32:42.840 --> 0:32:44.600 understand mortal existence all that. 0:32:44.640 --> 0:32:48.040 Well, you're right, and I think the comparison does Zeus 0:32:48.200 --> 0:32:50.320 is apt because in some ways he is kind of 0:32:50.360 --> 0:32:55.600 an arbidure of justice or a moral authority in some way, 0:32:55.640 --> 0:32:58.080 but he doesn't really seem to have much understanding of 0:32:58.160 --> 0:33:01.120 morality at all. It's like he he's like an a 0:33:01.440 --> 0:33:03.200 moral arbiter of justice. 0:33:03.960 --> 0:33:06.880 Yeah. Yeah, So it's an interesting role to look at again, 0:33:06.960 --> 0:33:09.160 thinking of it's easy to go in and think about 0:33:09.200 --> 0:33:11.480 his role in Halloween three, you know, where he is 0:33:12.120 --> 0:33:15.880 this evil corporate guy, and we also talked about him 0:33:15.880 --> 0:33:18.240 in the last Starfighter episode we did. He plays he 0:33:18.280 --> 0:33:20.920 plays a good guy in that he's covered in alien makeup. 0:33:21.960 --> 0:33:24.200 In this I guess I would say he is functionally 0:33:24.280 --> 0:33:27.440 a bad guy in terms of the effects of his behavior, 0:33:27.560 --> 0:33:31.760 but he doesn't have bad guy energy on screen. He's 0:33:31.800 --> 0:33:35.160 just sort of like an oblivious god who's bumbling around 0:33:35.280 --> 0:33:37.840 destroying people without really realizing it. 0:33:38.280 --> 0:33:41.080 Yeah, and ultimately he's not a power to be overcome 0:33:41.160 --> 0:33:44.880 by our heroes, but to be appealed to. So we'll 0:33:44.880 --> 0:33:48.000 talk about that when we talk about the climax. But yeah, 0:33:48.120 --> 0:33:51.080 Dan O'Hurley great actor of stage and screen. He lived 0:33:51.160 --> 0:33:54.080 nineteen nineteen through two thousand and five. Ah, but then 0:33:54.120 --> 0:33:56.840 we are true villain. Are one of our true villains 0:33:56.840 --> 0:33:59.920 on the corporate end of things, here is the character 0:34:00.120 --> 0:34:02.520 Dick Jones played by Ronnie Cox. 0:34:02.800 --> 0:34:05.680 Dick Jones is one of my all time favorite movie villains. 0:34:05.800 --> 0:34:08.920 I love him, and I love all the corporate villains 0:34:08.960 --> 0:34:12.000 in this movie, but Dick Jones is great and Ronnie 0:34:12.040 --> 0:34:15.480 Cox in this role. Ronnie Cox was simply born to 0:34:15.560 --> 0:34:19.880 play business creeps in Paul Verhoven films. One of my 0:34:19.960 --> 0:34:23.319 other favorites is his role as Coohagan, the villain who 0:34:23.400 --> 0:34:26.360 runs the for profit in Mars Colony in Total Recall. 0:34:27.320 --> 0:34:30.200 And this is a spoiler for Total Recall though if 0:34:30.200 --> 0:34:32.799 you don't want it spoiled, closeure ears for a second. 0:34:32.840 --> 0:34:36.040 But in that movie, if you'll recall he wants to 0:34:36.160 --> 0:34:39.040 prevent the use of an alien device that will make 0:34:39.120 --> 0:34:42.520 the atmosphere of Mars breathable because he wants to protect 0:34:42.560 --> 0:34:45.200 his racket selling oxygen to the Mars colonists. 0:34:45.560 --> 0:34:49.480 Yeah. Yeah, what a scoundrel. Though it's interesting. I was 0:34:49.719 --> 0:34:53.840 digging into it and this movie is you know, you 0:34:53.920 --> 0:34:57.000 now think of Ronnie Cox, you think of characters like Jones, 0:34:57.040 --> 0:35:00.319 but apparently he was playing somewhat against type on this one. 0:35:00.520 --> 0:35:04.200 He'd been mostly known for playing pleasant, white collar type characters. 0:35:04.880 --> 0:35:08.359 He made his screen debut in nineteen seventy two John 0:35:08.400 --> 0:35:12.120 Borman thriller Deliverance. We see him playing the guitar, and 0:35:12.160 --> 0:35:14.920 he's actually playing the guitar in that dueling banjo scene 0:35:14.960 --> 0:35:16.600 because he's also a singer songwriter. 0:35:17.239 --> 0:35:19.719 He is the character in Deliverance who has like the 0:35:19.800 --> 0:35:23.560 strongest moral compass. The others are are more like ruthless 0:35:23.600 --> 0:35:26.160 and practical. And he's like, no, we've got to go 0:35:26.200 --> 0:35:28.759 to the authorities and explain what happened and admit what 0:35:28.800 --> 0:35:31.720 we did and all that, and you know, Bert Reynolds 0:35:31.760 --> 0:35:33.680 has to argue with him and say, no, we got 0:35:33.680 --> 0:35:38.480 to cover it up, which again, yes, I guess seems 0:35:38.560 --> 0:35:41.799 against type to me because I was more familiar with 0:35:41.880 --> 0:35:44.200 him playing characters like Dick Jones. But yeah, I guess 0:35:44.239 --> 0:35:45.879 you could look at it the other way around as well. 0:35:46.520 --> 0:35:50.160 Yeah. The same year, seventy two, he also pops up 0:35:50.200 --> 0:35:52.839 in The Mind Snatchers, a sci fi film that has 0:35:52.880 --> 0:35:57.000 a cast that includes Christopher Walken, Joss Ackland, and Tom Aldridge. 0:35:57.560 --> 0:35:59.680 So some interesting names in there. I've never seen it. 0:36:00.040 --> 0:36:02.040 A fair amount of TV work followed, but he popped 0:36:02.080 --> 0:36:03.920 up in seventy nine Is the Onion Field, eighty two 0:36:03.960 --> 0:36:07.560 is The Beast within eighty four's Beverly Hills Cop, it's sequel, 0:36:07.880 --> 0:36:11.239 and then he did RoboCop. Subsequent credits include not only 0:36:11.320 --> 0:36:15.480 Total Recall, but the nineteen ninety Captain America film, the 0:36:15.520 --> 0:36:19.239 TV series Cop Rock Star Trek the Next Generation, and 0:36:19.520 --> 0:36:21.839 I don't remember this, but apparently has an uncredited role 0:36:21.840 --> 0:36:22.680 in Deep Blue Sea. 0:36:23.160 --> 0:36:25.799 Is he basically playing Dick Jones in that, like he's 0:36:25.800 --> 0:36:28.759 a corporate silver lord? Yeah? 0:36:29.080 --> 0:36:32.040 Yeah, because it's kind of like post RoboCop. That's one 0:36:32.080 --> 0:36:34.400 of the main reasons you're thinking about casting him. I'm like, 0:36:34.480 --> 0:36:36.960 I'm guessing, and you know, basically probably printed money there 0:36:37.000 --> 0:36:37.520 for a while. 0:36:37.840 --> 0:36:41.560 You can imagine the deep Blue Sea is just in 0:36:41.719 --> 0:36:45.440 the RoboCop universe, like they're making smart sharks. That just 0:36:45.480 --> 0:36:47.160 seems like another thing OCP would do. 0:36:48.080 --> 0:36:51.920 Yeah, I don't think I said his birthday. He was 0:36:51.960 --> 0:36:54.160 born in nineteen thirty eight, and he's still out there. 0:36:54.160 --> 0:36:57.560 I think he still performs as a musician as a musician, 0:36:57.600 --> 0:36:59.560 and I think he may still be active as an actor. 0:36:59.560 --> 0:37:02.280 I don't recall off han Ah. But we have another 0:37:02.320 --> 0:37:06.040 corporate character to talk about here, the character Bob Morton 0:37:06.480 --> 0:37:09.920 played by Miguel Ferrer, who lived nineteen fifty five through 0:37:09.960 --> 0:37:13.040 twenty seventeen American actor and son of Jose Ferrer and 0:37:13.160 --> 0:37:16.360 Rosemary Clooney, which of course made him George Clooney's cousin. 0:37:17.480 --> 0:37:19.680 George Clooney apparently showed up with him to a lot 0:37:19.719 --> 0:37:22.439 of these auditions back in the day they were oh 0:37:22.960 --> 0:37:23.560 living together. 0:37:23.680 --> 0:37:26.440 Yeah, what if a young George Clooney had been in 0:37:26.520 --> 0:37:30.560 RoboCop Farrer. 0:37:30.920 --> 0:37:34.000 He had a real knack for playing scoundrels. Started off 0:37:34.040 --> 0:37:37.600 in early eighties television and some forgettable films. Pops up 0:37:37.600 --> 0:37:40.879 as a first officer in Star Trek three. After Robocopy 0:37:40.920 --> 0:37:43.799 appeared in nineteen eighty nine's Deep Star six, one of 0:37:43.840 --> 0:37:46.560 the many underwater horror films of eighty nine. 0:37:46.880 --> 0:37:50.960 I think he undergoes a harrowing, explosive decompression in that film. 0:37:51.440 --> 0:37:54.480 Oh man, that's probably right. He was in nineteen nineties 0:37:54.520 --> 0:37:56.920 The Guardian, ninety two's Twin Peaks, fire Walk with Me 0:37:57.040 --> 0:38:00.439 ninety four is The Stand the mini series this did 0:38:00.520 --> 0:38:03.440 three episodes of Tales from the Crypt. I think that's commendable. 0:38:03.440 --> 0:38:07.400 I'm not sure who else did that many. He was 0:38:07.400 --> 0:38:10.400 also in ninety six is Project Alf ninety seven is 0:38:10.440 --> 0:38:14.040 the Night Flyer Mulan. In nineteen ninety eight he did 0:38:14.160 --> 0:38:16.080 the voice of the main villain. He was in two 0:38:16.080 --> 0:38:18.919 Thousands Traffic, and he pops up in Iron Man three 0:38:19.000 --> 0:38:21.319 and twenty thirteen. He did a lot of voice work 0:38:21.360 --> 0:38:23.840 late in his career, and appeared in the twenty seventeen 0:38:23.920 --> 0:38:24.960 Twin Peaks revival. 0:38:25.400 --> 0:38:28.239 Miguel Ferrer is also great in this movie. Like I said, 0:38:28.239 --> 0:38:30.640 I love all the corporate villains. He's a perfect foil 0:38:30.719 --> 0:38:35.080 to Dick Jones. So Ronnie Cox is older, colder, more calculating, 0:38:35.480 --> 0:38:39.360 and Miguel Ferrera's character Bob Morton is a young hotshot 0:38:39.400 --> 0:38:43.520 who thinks he's the next big thing, and they play 0:38:43.520 --> 0:38:46.520 off of each other well, but they're like both so detestable. 0:38:47.200 --> 0:38:51.879 Yeah. Yeah, Like Morton comes off as more likable in 0:38:51.920 --> 0:38:55.319 some regards, but it's because he's less directly awful and 0:38:55.440 --> 0:38:59.920 also doesn't resort to direct murder though is the all 0:39:00.320 --> 0:39:03.799 is very culpable for human deaths. So it's like they 0:39:03.800 --> 0:39:07.160 are both horrible, but they're different shades and degrees of 0:39:07.200 --> 0:39:10.880 the same awfulness. Yeah, Morton's this ambitious, coked up business 0:39:10.880 --> 0:39:13.200 bro who's definitely going to high five you in the 0:39:13.200 --> 0:39:16.399 men's room, but you know, at the end of the day, 0:39:16.520 --> 0:39:19.360 he's totally going to sign off on civilian or police 0:39:19.400 --> 0:39:23.520 deaths if it lets him advance up the corporate ladder. Yeah, 0:39:23.840 --> 0:39:26.000 these are two corporate characters, one more villainous than the other. 0:39:26.080 --> 0:39:27.360 Both of them both I think you could think of 0:39:27.400 --> 0:39:32.680 his villains, but they're essentially both lawful evil to a 0:39:32.680 --> 0:39:35.760 certain degree. We also have to have a little chaotic 0:39:35.840 --> 0:39:37.840 evil in this, and that's where we have the character 0:39:37.960 --> 0:39:40.760 Clarence Bodiker played by kurtwood Smith. 0:39:41.480 --> 0:39:45.360 Yeah. This raises another interesting theme of RoboCop, which is 0:39:45.400 --> 0:39:48.799 it depicts a world of an alliance between sort of 0:39:48.840 --> 0:39:52.960 big capital and big crime, like the criminal bosses and 0:39:53.000 --> 0:39:57.240 the corporate bosses essentially are working together against everybody else. 0:39:58.160 --> 0:40:01.560 Yeah yeah, yeah, other antagonists than the film though, or 0:40:01.680 --> 0:40:03.799 very much part of the corporate machine. You know, it's 0:40:03.880 --> 0:40:07.520 like they're to large degrees they can just be like, 0:40:07.560 --> 0:40:09.719 I'm just trying to climb up the corporate ladder here, 0:40:09.760 --> 0:40:12.279 I'm just doing what i have to do. I am 0:40:12.360 --> 0:40:15.279 part of this company. I'm part of OCP. But yeah, 0:40:15.320 --> 0:40:18.680 Clarence bodiker Is is very much all of the criminal 0:40:18.719 --> 0:40:22.920 world and is just evil. Just doesn't seem to love 0:40:22.960 --> 0:40:25.640 anything in life. It's just full of hate and violence. 0:40:26.160 --> 0:40:28.600 Even his cronies are not safe. 0:40:29.120 --> 0:40:32.080 He does seem to genuinely love crime like he loves 0:40:32.120 --> 0:40:32.600 his work. 0:40:33.080 --> 0:40:37.520 Yeah yeah. Now. Kurtwood Smith born nineteen forty three is 0:40:37.560 --> 0:40:40.440 an American actor of stage, screen, and TV that may 0:40:40.480 --> 0:40:42.560 be best known to many for his role as the 0:40:42.640 --> 0:40:46.240 dad on That seventies show, but this was his big 0:40:46.280 --> 0:40:49.840 breakout film role. And this was another case where, according 0:40:49.840 --> 0:40:51.319 to some of the extras I was looking at, you know, 0:40:51.600 --> 0:40:54.480 was very much against against type. This is not a 0:40:54.520 --> 0:40:57.120 guy who'd done a bunch of villain roles. They were 0:40:57.120 --> 0:41:01.480 thinking about other sort of established villainous actors like Michael Ironside, 0:41:02.080 --> 0:41:07.400 but they ended up liking kurtwood Smith, apparently because Verhoven 0:41:08.200 --> 0:41:12.200 liked how he kind of looked like Heinrich Himmler in 0:41:12.520 --> 0:41:15.279 The Little Glasses. He liked the idea of this being 0:41:15.360 --> 0:41:18.560 like a more of a cerebral villain to be the 0:41:19.280 --> 0:41:22.280 to be the adversary of RoboCop, who obviously nobody's gonna 0:41:22.640 --> 0:41:26.400 gonna best RoboCop physically, no human is anyway, as we'll see, 0:41:26.600 --> 0:41:29.160 So you need somebody who's more scheming, someone who's more 0:41:29.160 --> 0:41:29.920 of a hyena. 0:41:30.440 --> 0:41:33.640 I can see how this movie would have been again 0:41:33.719 --> 0:41:36.000 diminished if it had gone in a different direction, if you 0:41:36.040 --> 0:41:39.040 had the standard boxy, tough guy in the heavy role. 0:41:39.840 --> 0:41:43.160 Not to diss Michael Ironside, I mean, I love Michael Ironside, 0:41:43.160 --> 0:41:46.720 but the casting of a slightly nerdy looking but still 0:41:46.760 --> 0:41:51.160 imposing actor like Smith here is really inspired for this role, 0:41:51.200 --> 0:41:53.640 and it makes the character as memorable as he is 0:41:53.719 --> 0:41:57.720 instead of just another violent Hinchman. The Himmler image does 0:41:57.800 --> 0:42:01.800 come through. There seems to be something not just brutal 0:42:01.920 --> 0:42:05.640 but kind of transcendentally evil about the Bodicker we got, 0:42:05.960 --> 0:42:08.080 and it's also there in his name. He's not like 0:42:08.239 --> 0:42:12.320 you know, Biff Drago, He's Clarence Bodiker. 0:42:13.239 --> 0:42:17.400 Yeah. Yeah, it's a great performance. He's just so so nasty, 0:42:17.480 --> 0:42:22.560 so sadistic, and like the scene where he's eventually apprehended 0:42:22.560 --> 0:42:25.560 by RoboCop, roughed up and brought in and he's like spitting, 0:42:25.719 --> 0:42:30.400 he spits blood onto the police desk. Just just a 0:42:30.480 --> 0:42:34.360 wonderful performance. He followed up RoboCop with Roles in nineteen 0:42:34.400 --> 0:42:37.600 eighty eight, Rambo three, Dead Poet Society in eighty nine, 0:42:37.680 --> 0:42:41.479 Star Trek The Undiscovered Country, ninety two's Fortress, ninety three's 0:42:41.520 --> 0:42:45.440 Boxing Helena, and ninety five's Under Siege Too Dark Territory, 0:42:45.480 --> 0:42:46.480 plus lots more. 0:42:46.880 --> 0:42:50.719 Under Siege, Too Dark Territory. That's a movie with hacking 0:42:50.960 --> 0:42:54.720 in it. Yes, if you ever seen it, it's about hacking, 0:42:55.480 --> 0:42:55.759 all right. 0:42:55.760 --> 0:42:57.759 Getting back into the cop characters a bit. We have 0:42:57.840 --> 0:43:01.520 Robert Dukey in this playing Sergeant re With nineteen thirty 0:43:01.520 --> 0:43:04.480 four through two thousand and eight, another mainstay of all 0:43:04.480 --> 0:43:07.520 three RoboCop movies. His acting credits go all the way 0:43:07.560 --> 0:43:10.200 back to the original Outer limits. In the sixties, he 0:43:10.280 --> 0:43:12.200 worked a lot in TV and film. He did one 0:43:12.200 --> 0:43:15.840 of the voices on the nineteen sixties Harlem Globe Trotter's cartoon, 0:43:16.440 --> 0:43:18.560 and he had a memorable turn as the villain in 0:43:18.560 --> 0:43:22.359 the nineteen seventy three black exploitation film Coffee, which starred 0:43:22.400 --> 0:43:25.720 Pam Greer. He acted in three Robert Altman movies, seventy 0:43:25.800 --> 0:43:29.080 five's Nashville, seventy six is Buffalo Bill and the Indians, 0:43:29.160 --> 0:43:32.640 or Setting Bull's History Lesson and nineteen ninety three shortcuts. 0:43:33.160 --> 0:43:35.240 In this he plays the police sergeant who is putting 0:43:35.320 --> 0:43:39.319 up with impossible pressures imposed by OCP as they've come 0:43:39.360 --> 0:43:40.200 in and taken over. 0:43:40.760 --> 0:43:43.560 So yeah, it's a pretty standard role, but a notable actor, 0:43:43.880 --> 0:43:46.239 all right. Getting back into the criminal world. Here we 0:43:46.280 --> 0:43:50.279 have Ray Wise playing Leon Nash. This is one of 0:43:50.320 --> 0:43:54.879 the criminal henchmen to Botiker. Born nineteen forty seven. Wise 0:43:55.000 --> 0:43:57.240 is probably best known for his role of Leland Palmer 0:43:57.280 --> 0:43:59.879 and Twin Peaks, but he also played the doom Doctor 0:44:00.040 --> 0:44:03.560 Alex Holland and Wes Craven's Swamp Thing from nineteen eighty two. 0:44:04.080 --> 0:44:07.279 Other credits include eighty two's Cat People Cheevers Creepers two 0:44:07.320 --> 0:44:09.920 from two thousand and three, X Men First Class from 0:44:09.960 --> 0:44:13.920 twenty eleven, and Wrong Cops from twenty thirteen. Like a 0:44:13.960 --> 0:44:15.759 lot of these actors, he was apparently going in a 0:44:15.760 --> 0:44:20.040 somewhat different direction here, a little bit against type in 0:44:20.080 --> 0:44:21.280 the casting of this movie. 0:44:21.480 --> 0:44:23.600 Yeah, he also has a kind of weird energy as 0:44:23.640 --> 0:44:25.080 a henchman that works. 0:44:25.480 --> 0:44:28.760 Yeah. We also have to mention we mentioned Emil already. 0:44:28.840 --> 0:44:31.680 This is one of the other violent members of the gang. 0:44:32.400 --> 0:44:35.120 Has more of a anarchist vibe to him. You know, 0:44:35.160 --> 0:44:38.239 he's got the punk haircut and so forth. He is 0:44:38.280 --> 0:44:41.240 also a spoiler alert, he's the guy who gets melted 0:44:41.280 --> 0:44:43.040 by toxic waste. 0:44:43.640 --> 0:44:46.160 The extent to which RoboCop is a melt movie is 0:44:46.760 --> 0:44:50.080 non zero. There is a melting scene, and Emil is 0:44:50.120 --> 0:44:52.080 the poor soul who melts. 0:44:52.320 --> 0:44:56.200 Yeah. Played by Paul mccrane born nineteen sixty one. He 0:44:56.239 --> 0:44:59.000 made a big splash, you know, unintended because he does 0:44:59.080 --> 0:45:02.160 splash in this movie. But he made a big splash 0:45:02.160 --> 0:45:04.640 in nineteen eighty's Fame, and he was also a lot 0:45:04.719 --> 0:45:08.200 later a long time cast member on Er. He doesn't 0:45:08.200 --> 0:45:10.560 melt in either of those films, but he did follow 0:45:10.640 --> 0:45:14.000 up RoboCop with nineteen eighty eight's The Blob, So maybe 0:45:14.040 --> 0:45:16.560 he hadn't had quite enough melting yet at this point 0:45:16.600 --> 0:45:18.880 in his career. I did see in some of the 0:45:18.880 --> 0:45:20.520 exits they were like, oh, he was really down for 0:45:20.600 --> 0:45:22.720 all this makeup. He was down for this melt scene. 0:45:22.760 --> 0:45:27.279 So he both melts and splashes in the same role. 0:45:27.480 --> 0:45:31.759 Yeah, it's weird rewatching this film knowing how horrible this 0:45:31.880 --> 0:45:35.040 character's fate is, and even as we'd shown how horrible 0:45:35.080 --> 0:45:37.080 this character is, like he is not a nice guy, 0:45:37.760 --> 0:45:41.480 but his fate is so disgusting that you can't help 0:45:41.520 --> 0:45:43.239 but feel a little bad for him and see him 0:45:43.280 --> 0:45:45.239 at least as some sort of a tragic character. You 0:45:45.280 --> 0:45:47.040 want to be like, oh, dude, you're making all these 0:45:47.120 --> 0:45:49.520 terrible choices in life, and we know where they are 0:45:49.600 --> 0:45:50.040 leading you. 0:45:50.360 --> 0:45:52.719 Well, his friends are like Bodiker in the gang, and 0:45:52.760 --> 0:45:56.239 they don't It just shows how unloyal they are to 0:45:56.320 --> 0:45:58.560 each other when the way they react to him, like 0:45:58.600 --> 0:46:01.000 he's melting and he runs up on ray Wise, and 0:46:01.120 --> 0:46:04.160 ray Wise is he goes like help be and ray 0:46:04.160 --> 0:46:05.920 Wise is just like, don't touch me. 0:46:06.200 --> 0:46:11.640 Man. Yeah. Now, going back into the corporate world in 0:46:11.680 --> 0:46:13.359 the midst of all of these villains and all it's 0:46:13.360 --> 0:46:15.239 easy to miss some of how great some of these 0:46:15.280 --> 0:46:19.160 other small performances are. Like, you have this character, Donald Johnson, 0:46:20.680 --> 0:46:23.719 who's this kind of I guess a corporate o CP 0:46:23.960 --> 0:46:28.040 yes man and also just sort of a business goblin. 0:46:28.200 --> 0:46:30.879 I don't know. He's he's always there in these scenes. 0:46:30.880 --> 0:46:33.480 He's never the the he's never the you know, the 0:46:33.520 --> 0:46:35.960 central point of the scene. But he's he's there. He's 0:46:35.960 --> 0:46:40.200 attending all these business meetings and he's he makes every 0:46:40.239 --> 0:46:40.800 scene better. 0:46:40.960 --> 0:46:43.279 Yeah, he smiles a lot. He just brings a real 0:46:43.400 --> 0:46:47.480 positive energy to these board meetings where robots murder his colleagues. 0:46:48.000 --> 0:46:51.560 Yeah. Yeah, and he's largely unfazed by it. He's like business, 0:46:51.600 --> 0:46:52.799 business has got to keep moving. 0:46:53.000 --> 0:46:55.560 Looks like we hit a snag, but yeah we'll uh well, 0:46:55.880 --> 0:46:58.040 we'll do better next time. Yeah. 0:46:58.200 --> 0:47:00.919 Yeah. This character is played by fel Milton Perry born 0:47:01.000 --> 0:47:04.840 nineteen forty five. He was also in nineteen seventy three's 0:47:04.880 --> 0:47:07.200 Magnum Force. He did a lot of TV, played a 0:47:07.200 --> 0:47:10.200 lot of detectives, and with a cast member on the 0:47:10.280 --> 0:47:12.800 nineteen eighty series The Greatest American Hero. 0:47:21.719 --> 0:47:25.080 Now. RoboCop has a lot of great special effects and 0:47:25.360 --> 0:47:29.160 one notably terrible but in a lovable way special effects. 0:47:29.200 --> 0:47:30.520 So I feel like we got to talk about the 0:47:30.800 --> 0:47:31.480 effects a bit. 0:47:32.239 --> 0:47:35.520 Yeah, And as always, we can't mention everybody like this 0:47:35.960 --> 0:47:37.960 especially is a film where you had a whole crew 0:47:38.000 --> 0:47:41.600 of very talented artists in different fields and we can't 0:47:41.640 --> 0:47:43.640 possibly cover them all. So we're just going to cover 0:47:43.840 --> 0:47:47.360 I think like three main names that should be mentioned. First, 0:47:47.840 --> 0:47:51.359 we've already mentioned the melting and the makeup involved there. 0:47:51.880 --> 0:47:56.080 Rob Botein has special makeup effects creded on this. Born 0:47:56.160 --> 0:48:00.359 nineteen fifty nine, a true cinematic gore master. I think 0:48:00.360 --> 0:48:02.160 this is the first film we've looked at on Weird 0:48:02.160 --> 0:48:06.200 House that has directly involved him. His makeup credits include 0:48:06.320 --> 0:48:09.440 So Many Great Things, Squirm from seventy six, The Original 0:48:09.480 --> 0:48:12.600 Star Wars from seventy seven, The Howling from eighty one, 0:48:12.680 --> 0:48:16.479 John Carpenter's The Thing from eighty two, Legend from eighty five, 0:48:16.640 --> 0:48:20.400 Total Recall from nineteen ninety. He also did creature designs 0:48:20.560 --> 0:48:24.280 on nineteen eighties Humanoids from the Deep, That's a Fishman Movie, 0:48:24.480 --> 0:48:27.800 ninety seven's Mimic in nineteen ninety eight's Deep Rising. 0:48:28.239 --> 0:48:30.480 His work on the thing is especially iconic. 0:48:30.719 --> 0:48:33.239 Oh yeah, I mean, this is just a master of 0:48:33.920 --> 0:48:38.360 practical makeup effects. You know, these are things that you 0:48:38.960 --> 0:48:41.600 got to throw him into the same conversation with names 0:48:41.680 --> 0:48:45.280 like screaming Mad George. You know, just an absolute master. 0:48:45.760 --> 0:48:47.880 He doesn't seem to have worked much in the twenty 0:48:47.920 --> 0:48:49.839 first century at all, though, at least in terms of 0:48:50.120 --> 0:48:52.440 being credited on things. And I have to realize, I 0:48:52.440 --> 0:48:54.600 don't know, we always stress this, but it's my understanding 0:48:54.600 --> 0:48:57.640 that sometimes affects people's names don't actually make it into 0:48:57.680 --> 0:48:59.839 the final credits on things. So I don't know. Maybe 0:48:59.840 --> 0:49:03.480 he's working in other capacities behind the scenes, but according 0:49:03.520 --> 0:49:05.880 to you know, like the databases outside of a working 0:49:05.880 --> 0:49:09.360 on an episode of Game of Thrones, yea, his his 0:49:09.360 --> 0:49:11.880 his work in recent decades has been sparse. 0:49:12.360 --> 0:49:15.920 Do we do we know or just assume that Beteen 0:49:16.080 --> 0:49:19.760 is largely responsible for the emial melting scene. 0:49:20.680 --> 0:49:22.839 I didn't double check it. It's probably there's so many 0:49:22.880 --> 0:49:26.279 extras the ARO release, I didn't get to watch them all, 0:49:26.320 --> 0:49:28.840 but I assume he had to be have played a 0:49:28.880 --> 0:49:31.120 pivotal role in that. It's just too disgusting looking. 0:49:31.520 --> 0:49:34.920 Okay, but another main effect. So there are a lot 0:49:34.960 --> 0:49:37.279 of great special makeup effects in the movie. Also, there 0:49:37.320 --> 0:49:42.480 are interesting makeup effects clearly involved in realizing the the 0:49:42.680 --> 0:49:46.000 unmasked RoboCop effect when he takes his visor off and 0:49:46.040 --> 0:49:49.000 you can see Peter Weller's face jutting out of this 0:49:49.120 --> 0:49:52.760 robot exoskeleton. I'm sure that took a lot of effects 0:49:52.760 --> 0:49:54.720 work to make it look as good as it does. 0:49:55.200 --> 0:49:57.440 But there is another big thing in the movie, which 0:49:57.640 --> 0:50:03.080 is the rival project to the RoboCop project ED two nine, 0:50:03.160 --> 0:50:06.719 one of my favorite aspects of RoboCop, which is achieved 0:50:06.960 --> 0:50:10.239 largely with the help of stop motion effects that look 0:50:10.400 --> 0:50:14.680 great and are some of the funniest special effects I 0:50:14.719 --> 0:50:15.840 can think of seeing. 0:50:16.239 --> 0:50:20.000 Yeah, this is such a great creation. ED two o 0:50:20.160 --> 0:50:23.200 nine sometimes referred to in the credits as ED two thousand, 0:50:23.280 --> 0:50:25.440 so I guess maybe at some point in production they 0:50:25.440 --> 0:50:28.120 called him D two thousand. I don't know. ED two 0:50:28.120 --> 0:50:30.359 o nine is better Eed two o nine, if you will. 0:50:31.040 --> 0:50:36.120 But Craig Hayes is credited as ads creator and designer 0:50:36.840 --> 0:50:41.360 and also designer and constructor of the large prop for 0:50:41.520 --> 0:50:43.040 ED two nine, So when we see ED two o 0:50:43.160 --> 0:50:46.319 nine in the film, he's either standing there as a 0:50:46.360 --> 0:50:50.080 physical practical robot that's I think actually made out of 0:50:50.320 --> 0:50:54.239 out of wood and other materials, you know, and he 0:50:54.239 --> 0:50:57.040 doesn't move around much like just basically the top half 0:50:57.200 --> 0:50:59.560 rotates to point guns at you that sort of thing. 0:51:00.200 --> 0:51:02.480 But and then the rest of the time, as we'll discuss, 0:51:02.640 --> 0:51:06.560 he's a stop motion effect. But Hayes was involved in 0:51:06.600 --> 0:51:11.360 designing it apparently, you know, looked to various things like 0:51:11.400 --> 0:51:14.600 looked at trains a little bit and and other mechanical 0:51:15.840 --> 0:51:18.919 vehicles and robots to sort of design it, but also 0:51:18.960 --> 0:51:22.439 looked at the Orca that the head of ED Tone 0:51:22.520 --> 0:51:24.839 two nine is apparently partially based on the Orca. 0:51:25.160 --> 0:51:25.799 I can see that. 0:51:26.360 --> 0:51:29.760 Yeah, So Hayes did visual effects work on other notable 0:51:29.800 --> 0:51:32.000 films that he worked on Jurassic Park as part of 0:51:32.040 --> 0:51:35.800 Tippet Studio. He also worked on Hollowman, Blade two and 0:51:35.840 --> 0:51:38.960 two thousand and three is the Matrix Revolutions. Now I 0:51:39.040 --> 0:51:44.600 mentioned Tippett Studio. Yes, Phil Tippett is the is credited 0:51:44.880 --> 0:51:48.040 as the creator of the ED two nine sequences, more 0:51:48.080 --> 0:51:52.120 specifically the stop motion sequences. If you're not familiar with 0:51:52.120 --> 0:51:54.920 Phil Tippet born nineteen fifty one, he is one of 0:51:55.120 --> 0:51:58.640 if not the best known living masters of stop motion 0:51:58.800 --> 0:52:03.960 and monster special Effet. Somehow, this is our first Tippet film, 0:52:04.000 --> 0:52:06.360 I believe on Weird House Cinema. We've mentioned him in 0:52:06.400 --> 0:52:12.040 passing you know, connections on other films, but I don't 0:52:12.040 --> 0:52:15.000 think we've talked about him in depth before. You know. 0:52:15.200 --> 0:52:17.040 This is another situation where we can't list all the 0:52:17.080 --> 0:52:19.960 classics that he was involved in, but his creations have 0:52:20.000 --> 0:52:22.200 come to life in such films as some of the 0:52:22.239 --> 0:52:25.240 Star Wars movies. Nineteen eighty six is Howard the Duck 0:52:25.760 --> 0:52:29.320 as a notable stop motion monster at the end nineteen 0:52:29.320 --> 0:52:33.719 eighty eight Willow both RoboCop sequels, Jurassic Park in ninety three, 0:52:33.800 --> 0:52:37.960 Starship Troopers, and of course his own project, which was 0:52:37.960 --> 0:52:39.920 made over many years. I haven't seen it yet, but 0:52:40.480 --> 0:52:43.440 finally released in twenty twenty one, Mad God. 0:52:44.080 --> 0:52:47.239 Really good stop motion in this film. 0:52:46.800 --> 0:52:48.360 And we'll come back to talk a little bit more 0:52:48.400 --> 0:52:51.080 about ED two nine later on and just how incredibly looks. 0:52:51.080 --> 0:52:55.839 But finally, the music here is by Basil Polodorus, who 0:52:55.920 --> 0:52:59.720 lived nineteen forty five through two thousand and six, American composer, 0:52:59.760 --> 0:53:02.800 best known in film for his work with John Millius, 0:53:03.320 --> 0:53:06.719 who he met at USC studying filmmaking and composing. He 0:53:06.760 --> 0:53:09.799 also worked several times with Paul Verhooven. He worked with 0:53:09.960 --> 0:53:13.200 Millius as early as nineteen seventy on a student film 0:53:13.480 --> 0:53:17.600 and then later on seventy eight's Big Wednesday nineteen eighty 0:53:17.600 --> 0:53:21.480 two's Conan the Barbarian of course, that, in my opinion, 0:53:21.560 --> 0:53:25.040 is his master work, like that is such an incredible 0:53:25.320 --> 0:53:28.959 and just perfect score for that movie. But he also 0:53:28.960 --> 0:53:31.440 worked with Millius on Red Dawn from eighty four, Farewell 0:53:31.480 --> 0:53:33.239 to the King in eighty nine, in Flight of the 0:53:33.239 --> 0:53:37.520 Intruder in ninety one. With Verhoven, he worked with him 0:53:37.520 --> 0:53:40.560 for the first time on Plus Blood from eighty five, 0:53:40.960 --> 0:53:44.320 followed this up with RoboCop and Starship Troopers in ninety seven. 0:53:44.960 --> 0:53:49.799 Other scores of note include Renee Cardona Junior's Tinterera from 0:53:50.080 --> 0:53:53.439 nineteen seventy four, The Shark Movie or a Shark Movie, 0:53:53.480 --> 0:53:57.840 we should say the Shark Movie in any respect, also 0:53:57.920 --> 0:54:01.040 the Michael Crichton scripted Extreme Close Up in seventy three, 0:54:01.440 --> 0:54:03.960 The Blue Lagoon in nineteen eighty, Cherry two thousand and 0:54:04.080 --> 0:54:06.640 nineteen eighty eight. In the nineteen eighty nine mini series 0:54:06.680 --> 0:54:09.960 a lonesome dove. So for this movie, you know, solid 0:54:10.040 --> 0:54:14.320 catchy and sweeping score. I think a highly effective score. 0:54:14.360 --> 0:54:18.359 You know, it has the right bombosity for RoboCop. 0:54:18.640 --> 0:54:21.040 Yeah, I love the RoboCop theme. I think it's perfect 0:54:21.040 --> 0:54:24.640 for the film, and it sonically evokes exactly the feeling 0:54:24.719 --> 0:54:27.640 of the world and the plot, like it sounds like 0:54:27.680 --> 0:54:31.280 a doomed attempt at heroism in a bleak world ruled 0:54:31.320 --> 0:54:34.920 by bad men. Yeah, all right, you want to talk 0:54:34.920 --> 0:54:37.719 a bit about the plot. Yeah, let's let's dive right 0:54:37.760 --> 0:54:40.160 in now. This is one of those where I think 0:54:40.160 --> 0:54:42.719 it does not make sense to do a full scene 0:54:42.760 --> 0:54:46.279 by scene recap of the movie, but rather in this case, 0:54:46.320 --> 0:54:48.600 we're going to discuss a bit about the broad outline 0:54:49.040 --> 0:54:52.359 and some themes and highlights from the movie. One thing 0:54:52.480 --> 0:54:56.320 we've got to talk about is the are the media 0:54:56.440 --> 0:55:03.560 segments in RoboCop. RoboCop repeatedly breaks the action with news reports, commercials, 0:55:03.600 --> 0:55:07.319 and clips of TV shows from in universe, as if 0:55:07.360 --> 0:55:11.000 we were characters in the world of RoboCop watching the 0:55:11.040 --> 0:55:12.359 same TV they do. 0:55:13.400 --> 0:55:16.279 Yeah, and these are extended sequences. I'd forgotten just how 0:55:16.320 --> 0:55:20.520 long they are, Like you're watching RoboCop world television for 0:55:20.760 --> 0:55:24.040 minutes on end, including right at the top of the film, 0:55:24.320 --> 0:55:26.799 and it does a great job of positioning you within 0:55:26.840 --> 0:55:28.560 the world of the movie, of course, giving you a 0:55:28.560 --> 0:55:31.640 little backdrop for what's going on elsewhere in the world, 0:55:31.719 --> 0:55:35.000 what's going on in culture and media, but at the 0:55:35.040 --> 0:55:38.680 same time, in some ways counterbalancing the violence that we 0:55:38.719 --> 0:55:43.120 see on screen, but also driving home the satire and 0:55:43.200 --> 0:55:47.359 like keeping satire on your radar as you are interacting 0:55:47.520 --> 0:55:49.520 with the gritty details of the plot. 0:55:49.680 --> 0:55:51.320 There's a way that like when you see the news 0:55:51.400 --> 0:55:54.280 reports in the media segments sort of just lightly gloss 0:55:54.280 --> 0:55:58.279 over what sound like actually horrific events that sort of 0:55:58.320 --> 0:56:01.600 makes you see the event of the violent events of 0:56:01.640 --> 0:56:02.800 the plot differently. 0:56:03.360 --> 0:56:05.440 Yes, yeah, but anyways. 0:56:05.000 --> 0:56:06.800 Yeah, but a big part of what they do, especially 0:56:06.800 --> 0:56:09.560 at the beginning of the film is just world setting, 0:56:09.640 --> 0:56:12.160 you know, establishing what kind of world is this taking 0:56:12.200 --> 0:56:16.040 place in? And I would say the news segments from 0:56:16.120 --> 0:56:19.879 the world of RoboCop depict a kind of hyper Reaganite 0:56:19.920 --> 0:56:23.680 near future. So there is an idea that there's escalation 0:56:23.800 --> 0:56:26.960 of the Cold War, massive military build up, a lot 0:56:26.960 --> 0:56:30.799 of focus on weapons technology, and a supply side free 0:56:30.800 --> 0:56:33.840 for all where everything is run by for profit corporations 0:56:33.880 --> 0:56:37.040 and cash is king. And the first thing we see 0:56:37.080 --> 0:56:39.000 in the movie after like a sweep over the city 0:56:39.040 --> 0:56:42.080 and the title is a news segment, and so to 0:56:42.480 --> 0:56:45.719 set the scene of this world, it mentions before there's 0:56:45.719 --> 0:56:48.880 a segment about how the remaining enclave of the apartheid 0:56:48.920 --> 0:56:52.440 government in South Africa has unveiled their possession of a 0:56:52.480 --> 0:56:55.920 French made neutron bomb and has announced their willingness to 0:56:56.000 --> 0:56:59.400 use it against the people to protect white minority rule. 0:57:00.040 --> 0:57:03.800 There is another report from the new quote star Wars 0:57:03.960 --> 0:57:07.560 Orbiting peace Platform, and this appears to be a play 0:57:07.600 --> 0:57:11.320 on the so called Star Wars missile defense initiative, except 0:57:11.360 --> 0:57:15.080 in the movie the quote peace platform seems to be 0:57:15.200 --> 0:57:19.160 just some kind of like general orbital weapons system which 0:57:19.200 --> 0:57:21.640 they call a peace platform. And then in a later 0:57:21.720 --> 0:57:23.760 news segment in the movie, we find out that it 0:57:24.040 --> 0:57:28.320 quote accidentally fired a laser barrage at Santa Barbara, California 0:57:28.560 --> 0:57:31.280 during a test, and that kills hundreds of people, including 0:57:31.320 --> 0:57:34.200 two former presidents who are not named. And then the 0:57:34.240 --> 0:57:37.040 anchors just say the nation mourns for Santa Barbara, and 0:57:37.040 --> 0:57:38.600 then they move on to something else. 0:57:38.840 --> 0:57:43.000 And I mean it's implied that that's Ronald Reagan. Yeah, 0:57:43.040 --> 0:57:46.040 we see Ronald Reagan's body there on the ground. So 0:57:47.120 --> 0:57:50.040 the satire is at times pretty grim. 0:57:50.240 --> 0:57:54.120 But then it cuts straight from these horrific reports to commercials, 0:57:54.680 --> 0:57:57.440 and the commercials are for things. One is for the 0:57:57.440 --> 0:58:00.440 Family Heart Center, which is a clinic folk using on 0:58:00.480 --> 0:58:05.040 heart transplants with new mechanical artificial hearts. But the doctor 0:58:05.120 --> 0:58:07.120 in the commercial, at first he's like, you know, oh, 0:58:07.160 --> 0:58:10.240 it's time for a heart transplant, and then he transitions 0:58:10.240 --> 0:58:13.520 into sounding like he's pitching a customer on jet skis. 0:58:13.880 --> 0:58:17.760 He's like the series seven sports Heart by Jensen Yamaha, 0:58:17.920 --> 0:58:18.720 you pick the. 0:58:18.760 --> 0:58:23.360 Heart, which I guess also positions where we are in, 0:58:23.520 --> 0:58:24.840 like the cybernetic world. 0:58:25.280 --> 0:58:28.720 Yeah. Then there is an ad for a family board 0:58:28.840 --> 0:58:31.840 game called New Coom, a game that looks kind of 0:58:31.880 --> 0:58:35.120 like Battleship, except it's for four players, and it seems 0:58:35.200 --> 0:58:36.840 like the way you win the game is if you 0:58:36.880 --> 0:58:40.200 are the first player to use nuclear weapons. The tagline 0:58:40.200 --> 0:58:44.080 of the game is get them before they get you, Graham, Graham. 0:58:44.920 --> 0:58:47.680 Then there are ads for a car. This car has 0:58:47.720 --> 0:58:50.200 a big footprint in the movie. It is called the 0:58:50.280 --> 0:58:54.240 six thousand SUX. So that's kind of low hanging fruit joke, 0:58:54.400 --> 0:58:59.800 but you know, I wouldn't change it. This is apparently 0:58:59.840 --> 0:59:02.120 the hottest new car in the world now. It is 0:59:02.200 --> 0:59:05.680 extremely ugly, it gets eight miles per gallon, but it's new, 0:59:05.960 --> 0:59:08.800 it's huge. You've got to have one. The commercial makes 0:59:08.800 --> 0:59:10.840 the point that the car is bigger than Godzilla. 0:59:11.800 --> 0:59:14.080 Yeah, we have this nice commercial that has the stop 0:59:14.120 --> 0:59:16.440 motion monster in it, like very much in the Harry 0:59:16.440 --> 0:59:20.640 Housen style obviously created by Phil Tippett here, which is 0:59:20.680 --> 0:59:23.360 a nice nod to those movies that are in a 0:59:23.440 --> 0:59:25.680 very large way and inspiration for the creation of N 0:59:25.720 --> 0:59:26.360 two nine. 0:59:26.480 --> 0:59:30.320 But then also we see the TV content TV shows. 0:59:30.680 --> 0:59:33.240 The most popular TV show in the world of RoboCop, 0:59:33.240 --> 0:59:37.000 which we see multiple times, involves a man with glasses 0:59:37.000 --> 0:59:40.560 and a mustache ogling women in bikinis and then turning 0:59:40.600 --> 0:59:45.400 directly to the camera to utter his beloved catchphrase I'd 0:59:45.440 --> 0:59:49.920 buy that for a dollar. So, according to an article 0:59:49.960 --> 0:59:52.080 that I turned up, though it is not mentioned in 0:59:52.120 --> 0:59:56.000 the movie, the name of this TV sitcom is It's 0:59:56.080 --> 1:00:00.880 not my problem exclamation point and it's interesting. So the 1:00:00.920 --> 1:00:07.040 show is portrayed as just uh, insipid trash, But multiple 1:00:07.080 --> 1:00:10.800 times we see characters watching this show, such as there's 1:00:10.880 --> 1:00:16.040 one moment where this sadistic murderer Emil is watching the 1:00:16.040 --> 1:00:18.800 show on a TV through a shop window and he's 1:00:19.040 --> 1:00:21.040 I think he's like sitting in his car watching it, 1:00:21.520 --> 1:00:23.919 drinking a liquor bottle or something. He seems to find 1:00:23.960 --> 1:00:26.840 it marvelously entertaining, and then he ends up breaking the 1:00:26.840 --> 1:00:28.920 glass in the window so he can turn the TV 1:00:29.040 --> 1:00:32.200 up louder and laugh along with the laugh track. So 1:00:32.760 --> 1:00:36.360 something's interesting about the way RoboCop depicts this world of cruel, 1:00:36.480 --> 1:00:39.600 sadistic men who kill without a thought and then in 1:00:39.640 --> 1:00:44.320 their downtime are sedated and entertained by mindless, repetitive sitcoms 1:00:44.600 --> 1:00:46.720 that just seem to be looping the same scene and 1:00:46.800 --> 1:00:48.120 catchphrase over and over. 1:00:48.760 --> 1:00:52.080 Yeah. Yeah, that and Neil scene especially is interesting, you know, 1:00:52.120 --> 1:00:57.120 because they intentionally took time to show you his enjoyment 1:00:57.160 --> 1:01:00.440 of this show, that that this this bttom of the 1:01:00.440 --> 1:01:05.120 barrel misogynistic comedy that seems to be everybody's favorite, and 1:01:05.160 --> 1:01:07.960 I guess it also I'd buy that for a dollar 1:01:08.040 --> 1:01:11.080 like it just it also kind of ties into the 1:01:11.120 --> 1:01:16.160 overall capitalist, corporate world of RoboCop. Everything can be bought 1:01:16.160 --> 1:01:17.440 for a dollar, right. 1:01:18.040 --> 1:01:21.480 It's almost like a mantra delivering the hidden message that 1:01:21.520 --> 1:01:25.000 my trust and allegiance is cheap. Just give me the cash. 1:01:25.320 --> 1:01:37.439 Yeah, all right, Well let's talk more about the setting here. 1:01:38.360 --> 1:01:40.960 Yeah, so the media segments are used to establish a 1:01:40.960 --> 1:01:44.480 lot about the broader world. The specific setting of the 1:01:44.480 --> 1:01:47.640 movie is the city of Detroit in Michigan, where it 1:01:47.680 --> 1:01:52.520 seems the situation is there's some overlap with reality that 1:01:52.560 --> 1:01:56.400 the city was a thriving metropolis, but it has suffered 1:01:56.440 --> 1:01:59.280 a lot because a lot of the industry that used 1:01:59.280 --> 1:02:02.000 to be based there has moved offshore or shuttered in 1:02:02.080 --> 1:02:05.120 some way. So the film is just full of abandoned, 1:02:05.240 --> 1:02:11.160 empty factory buildings that continually visually communicate this theme of 1:02:11.200 --> 1:02:15.520 just like the loss of former prosperity and so forth. 1:02:16.080 --> 1:02:18.560 So huge portions of the city have been left out 1:02:18.560 --> 1:02:22.040 of work, impoverished, and desperate, and the city is essentially 1:02:22.080 --> 1:02:25.880 on the brink of collapse. So the job of running 1:02:25.920 --> 1:02:30.320 the local police department has been outsourced to OCP Omni 1:02:30.360 --> 1:02:34.360 Consumer Products. But OCP has set its sites higher than 1:02:34.440 --> 1:02:37.520 just running the police. Essentially, they have a plan to 1:02:37.600 --> 1:02:41.360 demolish the existing Detroit and replace it with a new, 1:02:41.720 --> 1:02:45.440 completely privately owned settlement called Delta City, where they will 1:02:45.520 --> 1:02:48.880 run everything. So in a way, you can see how 1:02:48.880 --> 1:02:51.880 it is in OCP's interest for things in Detroit to 1:02:51.960 --> 1:02:54.680 get as bad as they possibly can be so that 1:02:54.720 --> 1:02:57.360 they can buy up all the property cheap and privatize 1:02:57.400 --> 1:02:58.440 all the local government. 1:02:59.080 --> 1:03:01.600 Yeah yeah, but at the same time they need a 1:03:01.600 --> 1:03:04.560 little bit of muscle. And also they are, as we're 1:03:04.560 --> 1:03:07.600 told at one point, they basically are the military, so 1:03:07.640 --> 1:03:10.880 they're working on all of these various military projects. 1:03:10.480 --> 1:03:13.400 As well, right, And so amidst this backdrop, we see 1:03:13.440 --> 1:03:17.600 the OCP headquarters, which is this strange looking building that 1:03:17.640 --> 1:03:21.720 has a kind of inverted triangle architecture near the bottom, 1:03:21.800 --> 1:03:24.080 but then it just goes straight up from there, and 1:03:24.120 --> 1:03:28.080 so it's a very weird looking skyscraper architecture. But it 1:03:28.120 --> 1:03:30.560 does seem on theme somehow because it's like all of 1:03:30.600 --> 1:03:34.160 this concrete that comes down to a point near where 1:03:34.200 --> 1:03:36.040 it meets the ground. So it's the idea of like 1:03:36.120 --> 1:03:39.160 this corporation just like crushing the people on the ground. 1:03:39.720 --> 1:03:42.280 Yeah yeah. Again, the bottom part of this is Dallas 1:03:42.280 --> 1:03:45.600 City Hall, but by creating this map painting of it 1:03:45.800 --> 1:03:47.480 rising the rest of the way up into the sky. 1:03:48.560 --> 1:03:51.640 It's like it's stabbing into the earth, like it's a 1:03:51.760 --> 1:03:55.240 sword come down from the heavens. And we eventually see 1:03:55.560 --> 1:03:57.920 multiple shots at different points in the film of people 1:03:58.080 --> 1:04:01.760 ascending or descending elevators and some sort of you know, 1:04:01.960 --> 1:04:05.720 vast atriums of this building. And these are also created 1:04:05.720 --> 1:04:08.720 with Matt paintings. And in the extras on the Arrow 1:04:08.760 --> 1:04:11.480 Blu Ray they mentioned that Forbidden Planet was one of 1:04:11.520 --> 1:04:15.880 the influences here in creating this kind of vast interior space. 1:04:16.120 --> 1:04:19.400 I never would have made that connection, but that's really good. Yeah, 1:04:19.560 --> 1:04:21.920 But anyway, Okay, so here at OCP headquarters, we come 1:04:21.920 --> 1:04:24.640 in this corporate board meeting, which is a great scene. 1:04:24.640 --> 1:04:28.160 We've got OCP Vice President Dick Jones played by Ronnie Cox. 1:04:28.800 --> 1:04:32.080 He is showing off his plan to move on to 1:04:32.160 --> 1:04:35.440 the next stage in their control of the Detroit Police Force. 1:04:35.800 --> 1:04:39.600 He wants to essentially replace the remaining human police force 1:04:39.920 --> 1:04:43.800 with a violent police robot called ED two nine. He 1:04:43.880 --> 1:04:47.120 brings ED two O nine out for a demonstration that 1:04:47.320 --> 1:04:50.000 turns horrific robot. I don't know if you want to 1:04:50.040 --> 1:04:53.560 describe this scene. It's it's an iconic scene from the film, 1:04:53.600 --> 1:04:56.360 maybe the most remembered part of all of RoboCop. 1:04:56.920 --> 1:04:58.960 Yeah, I mean for starters, it has we have to 1:04:59.000 --> 1:05:00.840 mention that that ed to A nine And if you 1:05:00.840 --> 1:05:02.720 don't know what ed to nine looks, two nine looks 1:05:02.760 --> 1:05:05.360 like do do do yourself a favor and find an 1:05:05.360 --> 1:05:09.360 image surch or or video clip because it does not 1:05:09.400 --> 1:05:12.640 look like a policeman, looks like a weapons platform is 1:05:12.760 --> 1:05:14.640 and that is not what an illinoid and ship. Yeah, 1:05:14.640 --> 1:05:18.240 it's just a weapons platform that they're clearly eyeing for 1:05:18.720 --> 1:05:23.360 a larger military market. It was not created expressly with 1:05:23.480 --> 1:05:29.720 police work in mind. It is a frightening bestial machine. 1:05:30.320 --> 1:05:32.720 So Dick Jones is setting up the demonstration. He gets 1:05:32.720 --> 1:05:35.480 one of the one of his colleagues from the boardroom 1:05:35.520 --> 1:05:39.120 here to uh to point a gun at ED two 1:05:39.160 --> 1:05:41.240 o nine for the demonstration. And there's a little detail. 1:05:41.240 --> 1:05:43.200 A lot of people notice that he hands a gun 1:05:43.200 --> 1:05:44.880 to this guy. He's like, all right, let's see if 1:05:44.920 --> 1:05:47.040 we can make him do his job. And so the 1:05:47.080 --> 1:05:50.120 other guy points the gun at Dick Jones and ED 1:05:50.160 --> 1:05:52.640 two o nine does not react to this like of 1:05:52.720 --> 1:05:55.800 like people threatening each other, but then Dick Jones is like, no, no, 1:05:55.960 --> 1:05:58.200 pointed at ED two o nine. And so then when 1:05:58.280 --> 1:06:01.480 he when he threatens the herd, where then ED two 1:06:01.520 --> 1:06:04.560 o nine comes online and like points his turrets at 1:06:04.640 --> 1:06:06.840 him and says, you drop the weapon. You have twenty 1:06:06.880 --> 1:06:10.440 seconds to comply. So the guy he said, you know, 1:06:10.760 --> 1:06:13.080 he is goaged on by Dick Jones. He says, better 1:06:13.120 --> 1:06:16.000 do as you're told. So the guy drops the weapon, 1:06:16.520 --> 1:06:19.720 and then ED two o nine says, you now have 1:06:19.840 --> 1:06:23.880 fifteen seconds to comply. It clearly has not registered the 1:06:23.960 --> 1:06:27.200 loss of the weapon. So in a horrifically violent turn 1:06:27.240 --> 1:06:30.520 of events, the robot malfunctions and then ends up just 1:06:31.240 --> 1:06:34.280 liquefying this guy. It shoots him like hundreds of times. 1:06:34.720 --> 1:06:38.360 Yeah, just notoriously graphic scene, and some cuts of the 1:06:38.400 --> 1:06:42.920 film have the extended goification of this this poor dimmed individual. 1:06:43.480 --> 1:06:46.080 But yeah, and it's a frantic affair. He's trying to, 1:06:46.120 --> 1:06:48.840 like hi, run to for cover, and they're pushing him 1:06:48.880 --> 1:06:50.240 back in the way because no one else wants to 1:06:50.280 --> 1:06:53.800 get shot and caught the crossfire. And yeah, and then 1:06:53.880 --> 1:06:57.800 finally an utter failure of the program here, So. 1:06:57.800 --> 1:06:59.680 The old man looks at Dick Jones, it says, I'm 1:06:59.800 --> 1:07:03.040 very disappointed and you, Dick, and Dick Jones says, sure, 1:07:03.040 --> 1:07:09.120 it's only a glitch, like completely unconcerned with the threat 1:07:09.160 --> 1:07:11.680 this would pose to people. Is just kind of like, ah, yeah, 1:07:11.720 --> 1:07:14.520 we'll figure it out, don't worry about it. But this 1:07:14.600 --> 1:07:17.800 does seem like a pretty catastrophic failure to the old Man. 1:07:18.040 --> 1:07:20.920 And right there next to him, waiting in the wings 1:07:21.040 --> 1:07:24.120 is Bob Morton played by Miguel Ferrer, who steps in 1:07:24.160 --> 1:07:27.400 with his rival project. He's like, clearly ed two nine 1:07:27.480 --> 1:07:30.000 is not ready for prime time. We've got something ready 1:07:30.000 --> 1:07:33.080 to go, the RoboCop program, And he tells the old 1:07:33.120 --> 1:07:35.360 Man about it. It's ready to go as Plan B. 1:07:35.560 --> 1:07:37.960 All they need is a donor, and he thinks they 1:07:37.960 --> 1:07:40.440 should have one pretty soon. What does that mean, We're 1:07:40.440 --> 1:07:41.160 about to find. 1:07:41.000 --> 1:07:43.760 Out, Yeah, it may not be here. Maybe it's a 1:07:43.760 --> 1:07:46.880 little later that we learned that, Yeah, not only are 1:07:46.920 --> 1:07:49.640 they eyeing donors, but they are making sure that prime 1:07:49.880 --> 1:07:54.640 police candidates are being reassigned to dangerous zones so that 1:07:54.640 --> 1:07:57.120 they're going to be more likely to encounter some sort 1:07:57.160 --> 1:07:59.800 of fatal injury that would deliver their bodies. 1:08:00.240 --> 1:08:02.480 The RoboCop program, Yeah, they do they do like a 1:08:02.480 --> 1:08:04.840 physical and they're like, okay, Peter Weller, he would be 1:08:04.880 --> 1:08:07.040 a good candidate to go in the RoboCop suit, So 1:08:07.040 --> 1:08:09.680 we're gonna send him after Clarence Bodiker and deny him 1:08:09.680 --> 1:08:13.160 back up. Yeah, So here we meet our hero Alex 1:08:13.240 --> 1:08:16.559 Murphy and Peter Weller. After OCP transfers him to a 1:08:16.600 --> 1:08:19.880 new Metro division, he gets paired with his new partner Lewis. 1:08:19.920 --> 1:08:22.439 That's Nancy Allen. They get to know each other. They 1:08:22.479 --> 1:08:24.840 have some nice friendly banter, but early on maybe it's 1:08:24.840 --> 1:08:27.719 his first day at the new division, not exactly clear. 1:08:28.000 --> 1:08:30.519 They respond to a bank robbery in progress and it's 1:08:30.520 --> 1:08:34.200 Clarence Bodiker's gang and Botaker is just the nastiest, meanest 1:08:34.240 --> 1:08:38.760 criminal on earth. While Murphy and Lewis are chasing them, 1:08:38.800 --> 1:08:42.519 there's this one part where you see Bodiker just like 1:08:42.560 --> 1:08:45.559 the gang, has no friendship or loyalty even to each 1:08:45.600 --> 1:08:48.840 other of their One of the gang is injured during 1:08:48.880 --> 1:08:52.960 the shootout when they're in a chase, and Bodiker just 1:08:53.000 --> 1:08:55.760 like grabs him and goes can you fly Bobby and 1:08:55.920 --> 1:08:58.519 throws him out of the van into the police car, 1:08:58.640 --> 1:09:03.760 which briefly delay them and eventually Murphy and Lewis pursue 1:09:03.840 --> 1:09:07.080 the gang all the way to an abandoned foundry, and 1:09:07.200 --> 1:09:10.320 while attempting to make an arrest, again no backup is available. 1:09:10.320 --> 1:09:14.639 As usual, Murphy is caught and then brutally executed by 1:09:14.680 --> 1:09:19.360 the gang, an awful, horrifically violent scene. His body is 1:09:19.520 --> 1:09:22.599 recovered taken to a hospital, but he can't be revived. 1:09:22.640 --> 1:09:23.240 He is dead. 1:09:24.080 --> 1:09:28.439 Yeah, I think shotgun dismemberment is worth mentioning in terms 1:09:28.439 --> 1:09:31.880 of Murphy's death because, you know, because it's like, it's 1:09:31.960 --> 1:09:35.160 that extreme like that. It's another example of the violence 1:09:35.320 --> 1:09:38.599 just ratcheted up to an unbelow to a degree where 1:09:38.640 --> 1:09:41.120 it almost takes some of the punch out of it 1:09:41.160 --> 1:09:44.200 because it becomes an obvious Hollywood gore fest. I don't know, 1:09:44.400 --> 1:09:46.720 everyone's mileage is going to vary on this sort of thing. 1:09:47.400 --> 1:09:51.519 Now, next, we get a really interesting sequence in the movie, 1:09:51.520 --> 1:09:54.840 which is we have Murphy's death, but from here we 1:09:54.880 --> 1:09:59.200 start seeing something from some point of view through a 1:09:59.280 --> 1:10:04.320 kind of grain any almost computer or CRT image. We 1:10:04.360 --> 1:10:09.120 see these views of scientists messing with somebody from their 1:10:09.160 --> 1:10:11.920 point of view, like drilling around on their head and 1:10:11.960 --> 1:10:16.080 adjusting his vision. So we're seeing Robocop's point of view, 1:10:16.120 --> 1:10:19.760 and this is the project run by Bob Morton. Rob 1:10:19.800 --> 1:10:22.160 do you anything you want to identify about these scenes 1:10:22.160 --> 1:10:27.400 where we're like watching Murphy's physical remains become become able 1:10:27.479 --> 1:10:29.600 to see as they are becoming RoboCop. 1:10:30.120 --> 1:10:32.479 I mean, it's almost like he's being he is being 1:10:32.520 --> 1:10:36.559 born again. You know, it's like early memories, childhood memories almost. 1:10:36.600 --> 1:10:38.879 That's some sort of sense as he's watching the scientists 1:10:38.920 --> 1:10:42.320 work on him, as he's eventually seeing you know, there's 1:10:42.320 --> 1:10:46.160 like an office party, a Christmas party or something that's underway, 1:10:46.520 --> 1:10:49.479 and they're interacting with him a little bit. But also 1:10:49.560 --> 1:10:51.800 there are bits of dialogue though on the other hand 1:10:51.840 --> 1:10:54.160 that far from discussing him as a child. I think 1:10:54.200 --> 1:10:57.000 Morton in particular is like he's dead now. We can 1:10:57.040 --> 1:10:59.120 do whatever we want with him, Like he's no longer 1:10:59.160 --> 1:11:00.919 a human. He is a product. 1:11:01.360 --> 1:11:05.439 Yeah, he signed the rights to his remains away. That 1:11:05.520 --> 1:11:07.960 was part of his contract to be a cop, and 1:11:08.000 --> 1:11:09.840 we can do whatever we want with them. He's not 1:11:10.000 --> 1:11:10.639 him anymore. 1:11:11.240 --> 1:11:11.800 Yeah. 1:11:12.120 --> 1:11:16.840 Also in these scenes, we learn about robocops three prime directives. 1:11:16.880 --> 1:11:19.720 They say, you know, he's guided by the directives to 1:11:19.880 --> 1:11:22.679 serve the public trust, to protect the innocent, and uphold 1:11:22.720 --> 1:11:25.240 the law. And then there is a fourth directive that 1:11:25.360 --> 1:11:27.840 is not spelled out. It just says it's classified, but 1:11:27.920 --> 1:11:30.800 it does flash on the screen. They say nothing about 1:11:30.800 --> 1:11:33.519 that out loud. It's just something that RoboCop sees on 1:11:33.560 --> 1:11:34.879 his own heads up display. 1:11:35.400 --> 1:11:37.200 Yeah, this will become important later on. 1:11:37.960 --> 1:11:40.599 So after this RoboCop is unveiled, they put him out 1:11:40.600 --> 1:11:41.880 on the beat, and there are just a bunch of 1:11:41.880 --> 1:11:45.120 scenes of RoboCop out on patrol, intervening when crimes are 1:11:45.160 --> 1:11:47.920 in progress. We see him stop an armed robbery at 1:11:47.960 --> 1:11:50.960 a convenience store, he intervenes when two men are attacking 1:11:50.960 --> 1:11:54.479 a woman in an abandoned lot, He resolves a hostage 1:11:54.520 --> 1:11:57.479 situation at city hall. And in all of these scenes, 1:11:57.600 --> 1:12:00.600 RoboCop is shown to be in some ways highly effective 1:12:00.800 --> 1:12:05.000 in other ways not like he is successful at stopping 1:12:05.040 --> 1:12:08.519 the crimes, but he does so via the application of 1:12:08.640 --> 1:12:11.439 brutal violence in every case, and he has shown to 1:12:11.479 --> 1:12:15.200 be cold and mechanical in his relations to victims. 1:12:15.840 --> 1:12:19.160 Yeah, we see the media segments of him being celebrated, 1:12:19.200 --> 1:12:22.080 but also, yeah, at the same time, he's not really 1:12:22.160 --> 1:12:25.680 doing the ideal version of police work here. He's just 1:12:25.840 --> 1:12:29.240 like a blunt instrument that reaches through walls to grab 1:12:30.439 --> 1:12:31.639 criminals and so forth. 1:12:31.920 --> 1:12:35.120 There's one part where I think they're asking, like there's 1:12:35.160 --> 1:12:38.920 like school children clearly being terrified by RoboCop during some 1:12:39.000 --> 1:12:41.479 kind of outreach program, and they're like, do you have 1:12:41.479 --> 1:12:44.040 any message for the children, and he says, stay out 1:12:44.080 --> 1:12:50.719 of trouble. But all of this builds up to a realization. Lewis, 1:12:50.960 --> 1:12:54.559 Murphy's old partner, sees through the machine mask. She sees 1:12:54.600 --> 1:12:59.280 that it's Murphy underneath, noticing little ticks, little sayings and 1:12:59.360 --> 1:13:02.639 movements that mirror things Murphy did. One giveaway is that 1:13:03.000 --> 1:13:06.600 Murphy was practicing this kind of, you know, a cowboy 1:13:06.840 --> 1:13:10.120 gun holster move that was from a TV show that 1:13:10.200 --> 1:13:13.000 his son liked, called TJ Laser, And then she sees 1:13:13.120 --> 1:13:16.920 RoboCop do the same move, so she realizes who it is. 1:13:16.960 --> 1:13:19.040 She's like, that's Murphy in there, and she goes up 1:13:19.040 --> 1:13:20.760 to him. At one point she like approaches him in 1:13:20.760 --> 1:13:24.879 a hallway and says, Murphy, it's you, and this causes 1:13:24.920 --> 1:13:28.440 a crisis. RoboCop is not supposed to have a personality 1:13:28.600 --> 1:13:31.720 or any memories. Bob Morton again. He explains that like, 1:13:31.760 --> 1:13:35.120 it's just physical scaffolding. They just need some brain tissue. 1:13:35.520 --> 1:13:39.080 Murphy no longer exists, it's just brain tissue owned by OCP. 1:13:39.640 --> 1:13:44.040 That's not a person, it's a machine. But nevertheless, RoboCop 1:13:44.080 --> 1:13:50.040 begins to malfunction by having memories and dreams and glitches, 1:13:50.960 --> 1:13:52.839 and this leads up to a scene where he visits 1:13:52.880 --> 1:13:55.719 his former home that he shared with his family, which 1:13:55.760 --> 1:13:58.639 is now empty and for sale. There's like a robotic 1:13:59.360 --> 1:14:02.320 salesman who starts talking when he comes in the door, like, oh, 1:14:02.360 --> 1:14:04.880 this could be your new dream home. And I think 1:14:04.920 --> 1:14:07.240 some critics at the time might have sneered at these 1:14:07.640 --> 1:14:11.160 sequences of him, you know, this machine with these strange 1:14:11.400 --> 1:14:15.799 robotic motions, trying to reclaim his past life and remember 1:14:15.840 --> 1:14:18.520 what it was. They might have seen that as ridiculous. 1:14:18.560 --> 1:14:20.479 But I found this stuff quite moving. 1:14:20.920 --> 1:14:23.320 To each their own, I guess, yeah, yeah, this is 1:14:23.360 --> 1:14:25.879 one of the segments that really hit me in the fields. 1:14:26.439 --> 1:14:28.400 I liked it. I thought it worked. 1:14:28.600 --> 1:14:31.799 Also, somewhere in here there's a scene where Dick Jones 1:14:32.000 --> 1:14:34.599 sends Clarence Bodiker, who works for him by the way 1:14:34.920 --> 1:14:38.400 to Bob Morton's house to kill him. He's just like, Okay, 1:14:38.439 --> 1:14:39.280 I'm done with Morton. 1:14:40.040 --> 1:14:42.960 Yeah. Yeah, Like Morton really didn't know what he was 1:14:43.040 --> 1:14:46.519 messing with it clearly didn't really think that Dick Jones 1:14:46.520 --> 1:14:49.840 would send a goon to his house to murder him 1:14:49.840 --> 1:14:51.839 in cold blood, and that's exactly what happens. 1:14:52.240 --> 1:14:55.439 Then there's an interesting middle section of the movie in 1:14:55.479 --> 1:15:01.360 which RoboCop, in this process of redis discovering that he 1:15:01.439 --> 1:15:03.479 might have been a person at one point and who 1:15:03.520 --> 1:15:09.439 that person was. He starts to systematically solve Murphy's own murder. 1:15:09.800 --> 1:15:13.840 So he like encounters Emil, one of Clarence Bodaker's gang 1:15:14.680 --> 1:15:17.840 in the middle of like robbing a gas station, and 1:15:17.960 --> 1:15:20.640 he encounters him, and from him he traces him to 1:15:20.800 --> 1:15:24.640 other members of Botacker's gang and eventually to Botaker himself. 1:15:25.080 --> 1:15:28.160 And when he when he captures Bodiker, Bodeker claims that 1:15:28.240 --> 1:15:30.839 he can't be arrested because he has a protection agreement 1:15:30.880 --> 1:15:34.160 he works for Dick Jones, and Dick Jones runs the police. 1:15:34.640 --> 1:15:38.719 Yeah, this whole solving Zone murder series of sequences is great. 1:15:39.040 --> 1:15:40.679 Like there's a scene where he goes to the nightclub 1:15:40.720 --> 1:15:43.800 to collect Ray Wise's character Yeah, that one's a lot 1:15:43.840 --> 1:15:48.680 of fun. Yeah. It builds nicely until he's yeah, he's 1:15:48.720 --> 1:15:52.520 already found Botaker that Bodika. This is where there's a 1:15:52.600 --> 1:15:56.479 He roughs him up quite a bit and drags a bloody, 1:15:56.560 --> 1:15:59.000 snarling Boticker into police headquarters. 1:15:59.439 --> 1:16:03.120 But so now he has evidence that Dick Jones is 1:16:03.120 --> 1:16:05.120 behind it all. So he tries to go up the 1:16:05.200 --> 1:16:07.720 chain to arrest Dick Jones and it doesn't work out 1:16:07.720 --> 1:16:11.160 so well. He walks into the office Ronnie Cox is 1:16:11.160 --> 1:16:14.160 sitting there, and Ronnie Cox like holds out his hands. 1:16:14.200 --> 1:16:17.000 He says, sounds pretty serious, you better arrest me. But 1:16:17.120 --> 1:16:22.400 RoboCop is somehow unable to act. Something is preventing him, 1:16:22.680 --> 1:16:25.920 and here we see the activation of Directive four, his 1:16:26.080 --> 1:16:29.679 secret guiding principle, which is that he cannot act against 1:16:29.720 --> 1:16:33.479 the interests of OCP, so he cannot will himself to 1:16:33.680 --> 1:16:35.320 arrest one of its officers. 1:16:36.160 --> 1:16:38.280 Oh yeah, and then this is where Dick Jones, with 1:16:38.720 --> 1:16:42.040 villainous charm, brings out ED two O nine. He's like, 1:16:42.120 --> 1:16:43.719 I going to introduce you to a friend of mine. 1:16:44.520 --> 1:16:49.120 Boardroom doors open and out comes this glorious stop motion creation. 1:16:50.000 --> 1:16:52.560 ED two O nine is here to finish off RoboCop. 1:16:52.800 --> 1:16:55.719 So yeah, for a bit, there's this fight, the struggle 1:16:55.720 --> 1:16:58.719 where RoboCop is sort of immobilized. It's these two killer 1:16:58.800 --> 1:17:02.000 robots versus each other, but one of them still has 1:17:02.120 --> 1:17:05.240 a shred of humanity inside it and it manages to 1:17:05.479 --> 1:17:08.519 barely escape ED two O nine. And then there is 1:17:08.560 --> 1:17:11.000 a detail in this fight that I've always loved since 1:17:11.000 --> 1:17:13.519 the first time I saw the movie. What how is 1:17:13.680 --> 1:17:17.160 ED to O nine defeated In this confrontation by stairs? 1:17:17.439 --> 1:17:21.000 ED two O nine gets to the stairwell and RoboCop 1:17:21.080 --> 1:17:23.439 runs down it and ED to O nine clearly this 1:17:23.560 --> 1:17:25.960 is a contingency that the designers of ED two O 1:17:26.040 --> 1:17:28.479 nine had never thought of, and it is unable to 1:17:28.600 --> 1:17:32.360 navigate going down a staircase and ends up turned on 1:17:32.400 --> 1:17:36.720 its back and unable to get up. And it's hilarious. 1:17:37.160 --> 1:17:41.000 It feels so right, and it's the best possible conclusion 1:17:41.080 --> 1:17:41.639 to this fight. 1:17:42.200 --> 1:17:44.720 Yeah, yeah, it hits all the right notes, and in 1:17:44.760 --> 1:17:47.120 a sense like it does get into this again sort 1:17:47.120 --> 1:17:50.800 of light sci fi about cybernetics and robotics. The idea 1:17:50.840 --> 1:17:54.320 that ED two nine is a military application that is 1:17:54.360 --> 1:17:56.840 clearly clearly was not designed for police work. It was 1:17:56.880 --> 1:18:00.120 not designed to interact in a human world, and an 1:18:00.120 --> 1:18:03.000 important part of police work is interacting in a human world. 1:18:03.439 --> 1:18:06.960 That involves obviously things like stairs, as well as other 1:18:07.120 --> 1:18:10.200 nuances like being able to tell the difference between a 1:18:11.400 --> 1:18:14.439 perpetrator who is an active threat and someone who has 1:18:14.479 --> 1:18:16.080 already surrendered and so forth. 1:18:16.320 --> 1:18:18.600 Yeah, and so I think that I think part of 1:18:18.640 --> 1:18:20.800 the vision of ED two nine is that it is 1:18:20.840 --> 1:18:24.280 a very dangerous lethal robot, but in many ways it 1:18:24.320 --> 1:18:28.840 is poorly designed. So it's like it is designed to 1:18:29.360 --> 1:18:33.760 appeal to the people who award defense contracts more than 1:18:33.800 --> 1:18:35.639 to like actually be good at its job. 1:18:36.240 --> 1:18:41.040 Right. But again, great great finish to this initial combat 1:18:41.080 --> 1:18:43.120 between RoboCop and ED two to nine. 1:18:43.280 --> 1:18:45.800 But at this point, so RoboCop is he's able to 1:18:45.840 --> 1:18:48.320 get down the stairs. But at this point the OCP 1:18:48.479 --> 1:18:51.200 controlled police Force arrives and they have been ordered to 1:18:51.280 --> 1:18:55.320 destroy RoboCop, and so they try, but Lewis saves him. 1:18:55.400 --> 1:18:57.640 She comes to the rescue. She takes him off to 1:18:57.800 --> 1:19:01.640 the abandoned foundry we saw earlier and helps him rediscover 1:19:01.720 --> 1:19:04.360 who he is. And this sequence, his mask comes off, 1:19:04.400 --> 1:19:07.240 like he removes the bolts and takes off his visor 1:19:07.560 --> 1:19:11.880 and reveals that Murphy's face is still underneath there to 1:19:11.880 --> 1:19:15.599 some extent. His brain still is Murphy's brain, though it's 1:19:15.680 --> 1:19:18.599 different and there, I don't know. There's like a really 1:19:18.600 --> 1:19:22.240 tender scene where she helps him recalibrate his aim and 1:19:22.320 --> 1:19:25.200 it just kind of gives him encouragement. He doesn't know 1:19:25.240 --> 1:19:27.639 what he is, but whatever he is, she's there to help. 1:19:28.280 --> 1:19:31.960 Yeah. Yeah, I really liked this part. Also, the part 1:19:32.000 --> 1:19:33.599 where after the mask has come off and he has 1:19:33.600 --> 1:19:37.400 to be left alone. You know, it's it's a tender moment. 1:19:37.479 --> 1:19:40.720 That is, it's well acted by both actors involved here, 1:19:40.800 --> 1:19:43.000 and you know, I totally totally buy into it, and 1:19:43.680 --> 1:19:45.519 it made me tear up just a little bit. 1:19:46.120 --> 1:19:49.640 Meanwhile, Dick Jones hooks Bodiker's gang up with some kind 1:19:49.680 --> 1:19:52.160 of military grade weapons that they are going to need 1:19:52.200 --> 1:19:56.040 to destroy RoboCop. Jones of course wants RoboCop dead for 1:19:56.120 --> 1:19:59.759 two reasons. First of all, RoboCop has evidence against Jones 1:19:59.760 --> 1:20:02.560 and his memory banks, and he doesn't want to be implicated. 1:20:02.600 --> 1:20:05.680 But the second thing is, of course, if RoboCop is eliminated, 1:20:05.680 --> 1:20:09.240 that'll put ed to nine that project back front and center. 1:20:09.800 --> 1:20:12.320 Yeah, yeah, he's promising to have an ED two o nine, 1:20:12.360 --> 1:20:14.360 like on every street corner. So there are already a 1:20:14.439 --> 1:20:16.800 lot of these in stories just ready to roll out 1:20:16.800 --> 1:20:18.000 into the city in force. 1:20:18.680 --> 1:20:21.280 So Botaker and the gang now armed with these, with 1:20:21.320 --> 1:20:24.519 this heavy artillery, they come to hunt down RoboCop at 1:20:24.560 --> 1:20:27.920 the foundry. But there and this leads to a bunch 1:20:27.960 --> 1:20:30.280 of great action scenes. There's like a car chase and 1:20:30.320 --> 1:20:33.519 there are these shootouts and all that together RoboCop and 1:20:33.600 --> 1:20:37.600 Lewis managed to defeat Bodiker and his gang. This is 1:20:37.640 --> 1:20:41.160 the sequence that includes Emil getting doused with toxic waste 1:20:41.160 --> 1:20:46.519 and eventually melting. So it's incredibly gory action scenes. We've 1:20:46.560 --> 1:20:49.160 said that a million times now, but like you be warned, 1:20:49.240 --> 1:20:52.719 this is an incredibly bloody, violent movie. But as action scenes, 1:20:52.720 --> 1:20:53.880 they work pretty great. 1:20:54.520 --> 1:20:57.479 Yeah. Yeah, I mean I've seen my shareff Gorfest and 1:20:57.479 --> 1:21:00.240 I've seen this film before obviously, but yeah, when I 1:21:00.320 --> 1:21:03.479 was rewatching the emeal melting sequence, it's just like like 1:21:03.520 --> 1:21:08.120 I had a just like a grimace fixed into my 1:21:08.200 --> 1:21:12.160 face for like a good solid five minutes because it's 1:21:12.160 --> 1:21:14.360 so grim and it's so gross, and it seems to 1:21:14.439 --> 1:21:18.439 go on forever until he's finally hit by a car 1:21:18.880 --> 1:21:22.120 by a boticker's car and just explodes in a splash 1:21:22.160 --> 1:21:23.839 of slime. It's awful. 1:21:24.240 --> 1:21:29.200 Yeah. So after all this, RoboCop goes to arrest Dick 1:21:29.280 --> 1:21:32.799 Jones because you know OCP is behind it all, working 1:21:32.800 --> 1:21:36.080 on Dick Jones's orders. So RoboCop comes into a board 1:21:36.120 --> 1:21:39.880 meeting and he turns the old Man against him by 1:21:39.880 --> 1:21:42.559 playing a tape of Dick Jones admitting the murder of 1:21:42.600 --> 1:21:46.000 Bob Morton. Now you know, OCP may not be very 1:21:46.360 --> 1:21:50.320 sensitive to the harm they caused to regular people, but 1:21:50.520 --> 1:21:53.480 this is the murder of one of these corporate guys themselves, 1:21:53.479 --> 1:21:56.800 and I think they're unsettled by that. So so now 1:21:56.880 --> 1:22:00.240 Dick Jones actually feels afraid. He tries to take the 1:22:00.280 --> 1:22:04.519 old Man hostage to flee the scene. And here there's 1:22:04.520 --> 1:22:08.160 an interesting conflict because RoboCop is still bound by Directive four, 1:22:08.280 --> 1:22:11.519 so he cannot act against OCP. He can't act against Jones. 1:22:12.080 --> 1:22:16.040 But then he he essentially hints to the old Man 1:22:16.120 --> 1:22:20.360 what the problem is, and the old Man then announces 1:22:20.400 --> 1:22:24.120 that Jones is fired from his position. So RoboCop immediately 1:22:24.120 --> 1:22:28.479 shoots him out of the skyscraper window. So that's an 1:22:28.520 --> 1:22:30.960 interesting twist, and then there is a special effect. Well, 1:22:30.960 --> 1:22:34.400 the special effects generally in this movie are fantastic. There 1:22:34.479 --> 1:22:37.240 is a famously bad one as Jones falls out of 1:22:37.280 --> 1:22:39.280 the window and it looks like he has really long 1:22:39.479 --> 1:22:40.879 arms for some reason. 1:22:41.680 --> 1:22:44.360 Yeah, this is a stop motion effect. They use a 1:22:44.479 --> 1:22:48.760 stop motion model of Dick Jones, which I mean basically, 1:22:49.920 --> 1:22:51.760 I guess you have to think about about stop motion 1:22:51.880 --> 1:22:54.120 a lot with this film, Like stop motion is here 1:22:55.040 --> 1:22:57.479 and used in this film, not so much because it 1:22:57.560 --> 1:23:01.160 is loving and well Craft did and is like an 1:23:01.240 --> 1:23:03.800 art form all its own. It was the best way 1:23:03.840 --> 1:23:08.559 of delivering this particular effect at the time. And so 1:23:08.840 --> 1:23:10.719 with Dick, even with Dick Jones falling out the window, 1:23:10.800 --> 1:23:12.880 like what are your choices? You either don't show it, 1:23:13.479 --> 1:23:16.600 or you use like a Dick Jones lying on a 1:23:17.040 --> 1:23:19.040 blue mat and do like a green scaring kind of 1:23:19.080 --> 1:23:21.320 a thing where he's like, ah, you know, like Mortal 1:23:21.400 --> 1:23:25.280 Kombat too falling into the pit, which can also look 1:23:25.320 --> 1:23:28.080 pretty bad. Or you go first stop motion, and in 1:23:28.120 --> 1:23:31.040 this case it didn't quite work, like they were trying 1:23:31.040 --> 1:23:33.679 to create something that was too lifelike. But I wouldn't 1:23:33.760 --> 1:23:36.559 change it. Yeah, I wouldn't change it still admired. 1:23:36.880 --> 1:23:39.920 I love the long arms that it gives me a 1:23:39.960 --> 1:23:40.840 tickle every time. 1:23:42.360 --> 1:23:44.599 This was a time period too where like that sort 1:23:44.640 --> 1:23:46.840 of shot, I feel like happened a lot. You had 1:23:46.880 --> 1:23:48.960 a lot of bad guys falling to their death, Like 1:23:49.000 --> 1:23:52.519 didn't the Joker go down the same way? Maybe a 1:23:52.560 --> 1:23:57.600 slightly more convincing effect. I don't recall, yeah, falling off skyscrapers. 1:23:57.600 --> 1:23:59.160 They'll do it well anyway. 1:23:59.280 --> 1:24:03.760 So after this, the old man says, he says something 1:24:03.760 --> 1:24:07.160 like nice shooting, son. What's your name? And RoboCop does 1:24:07.200 --> 1:24:11.320 not say RoboCop. He says Murphy. And that's the end 1:24:11.320 --> 1:24:15.839 of the film. And it's an interesting ending because Murphy 1:24:16.000 --> 1:24:22.120 has somewhat reclaimed his humanity, Like he has acted against 1:24:22.439 --> 1:24:26.080 the direct interests of his one of his bosses in 1:24:26.080 --> 1:24:29.160 this case, so he has somewhat done the right thing 1:24:29.280 --> 1:24:32.519 despite what he's being told to do by the by 1:24:32.520 --> 1:24:35.799 the organization that controls him. He has to some degree 1:24:35.880 --> 1:24:39.400 recovered part of himself in that like he you know, 1:24:39.439 --> 1:24:42.720 he remembers his family, he remembers his life. Even though 1:24:42.760 --> 1:24:46.680 he's not fully the Murphy he was, he realizes some 1:24:46.760 --> 1:24:50.360 part of him is Murphy, but he's still not completely free, 1:24:50.439 --> 1:24:52.840 and I think that makes the ending more interesting and 1:24:52.880 --> 1:24:56.080 bittersweet than if he just had like a total victory 1:24:56.160 --> 1:24:58.599 over the bad guys. He's still not fully free because 1:24:58.600 --> 1:25:01.400 he's not able to remove direc he just has to, 1:25:01.680 --> 1:25:04.200 like outsmart it, find a way around it by getting 1:25:04.439 --> 1:25:07.000 the old Man to fire Dick Jones so he can act. 1:25:07.240 --> 1:25:09.840 But again, thinking of Dick Jones as kind of a 1:25:09.880 --> 1:25:13.599 god or Zeus figure, it's like he has he has 1:25:13.640 --> 1:25:16.560 scaled at the top of Mount Olympus once more, and 1:25:16.880 --> 1:25:19.519 I guess we also have a Satanic figure literally falling 1:25:20.439 --> 1:25:25.200 from the heights here. But then the old Man has 1:25:25.240 --> 1:25:27.559 to acknowledge him, and in asking him his name, there 1:25:27.600 --> 1:25:29.880 is kind of like a power there. It's like like, 1:25:30.040 --> 1:25:33.920 this is your chance to reclaim some portion of humanity 1:25:33.960 --> 1:25:36.559 that we took from you. And he does reclaim at 1:25:36.640 --> 1:25:37.360 least part of it. 1:25:37.760 --> 1:25:40.120 Yeah, but like we said, it's not a complete victory, 1:25:40.479 --> 1:25:43.160 you know, It's not like OCP is completely defeated and 1:25:43.760 --> 1:25:45.880 the world has changed for the better. I mean, it's 1:25:45.920 --> 1:25:49.000 a small, limited victory, but at least it is that 1:25:49.080 --> 1:25:51.719 in this otherwise bleak and horrible world. 1:25:52.160 --> 1:25:54.920 Yeah, I mean there's so many great little moments, like 1:25:55.160 --> 1:25:57.719 the final showdown with Bodiker, of course, where he stabs 1:25:57.800 --> 1:26:00.240 him in the neck, which apparently they wanted to do 1:26:00.320 --> 1:26:03.960 something grizzlier, and this was the this was thing, the 1:26:04.040 --> 1:26:06.160 less grizzly version, you know. And I guess you don't 1:26:06.160 --> 1:26:09.840 actually see him stab him in the neck. You just see, 1:26:09.840 --> 1:26:13.200 like way too his blood splashed unto Robocop's chest and 1:26:13.200 --> 1:26:17.040 then you see Bodiker stumbling away with blood gushing out 1:26:17.040 --> 1:26:20.840 of his Neck's still incredibly violent, but I'd forgotten that 1:26:20.840 --> 1:26:24.160 you don't actually see it going into his neck. 1:26:24.760 --> 1:26:27.160 The spike that he uses to kill Bodiker there is 1:26:27.200 --> 1:26:29.320 not actually meant to be a weapon. It is the 1:26:29.479 --> 1:26:32.320 jack that he uses to interface with the police computer. 1:26:32.960 --> 1:26:35.439 Yeah, and when he busts it out again to load 1:26:35.479 --> 1:26:39.280 the incriminating evidence, it's still bloody with Botaker's blood. But 1:26:39.800 --> 1:26:43.360 shortly after that there's that scene where Lewis is all 1:26:43.479 --> 1:26:46.360 is shot up and you know they've they've defeated the 1:26:46.400 --> 1:26:49.080 bad guys there, and this is at the industrial site 1:26:49.439 --> 1:26:52.800 and RoboCop says to her it's like, don't worry, they'll 1:26:52.840 --> 1:26:55.040 fix you up. They always do, or something to those. 1:26:54.920 --> 1:26:56.759 Effects which they fix everything. 1:26:57.000 --> 1:27:00.439 They fix everything, which which ties into this feeling of yeah, 1:27:00.479 --> 1:27:04.040 the sort of the the partial victory, like the powers 1:27:04.040 --> 1:27:07.040 that the are still very much in charge and are 1:27:07.120 --> 1:27:09.960 very much the deciders of life and death and resurrection, 1:27:11.200 --> 1:27:15.040 but some monicum of victory, some some shred of humanity 1:27:15.040 --> 1:27:15.960 has been reclaimed. 1:27:16.400 --> 1:27:19.439 So that's RoboCop. Would you buy that for a dollar? 1:27:20.680 --> 1:27:23.759 Yes, I would. I would buy it for thirty plus 1:27:23.760 --> 1:27:27.640 dollars whatever the going rate for the Blu Ray is, 1:27:28.479 --> 1:27:31.599 you know, or you know, rent it digitally or physically 1:27:31.640 --> 1:27:33.360 for somewhere in the neighborhood of four or five dollars. 1:27:33.520 --> 1:27:34.920 Well worth it, well worth the time. 1:27:35.320 --> 1:27:36.479 Okay, that's all I've got. 1:27:36.800 --> 1:27:38.439 All Right, We're going to go ahead and close out 1:27:38.479 --> 1:27:40.719 this episode. I think we have one more episode before 1:27:40.800 --> 1:27:44.719 our Christmas selection, so you know, keep your eyes open 1:27:44.720 --> 1:27:46.519 to see what we're going to be covering. You can 1:27:46.600 --> 1:27:49.879 follow the films that we cover on Weird House Cinema 1:27:49.880 --> 1:27:52.240 by going to letterbox dot com. That's l E T 1:27:52.240 --> 1:27:54.360 T E R b o x D dot com. Our 1:27:54.560 --> 1:27:56.519 username there is weird House, and we have a nice 1:27:56.560 --> 1:27:58.680 list of all the movies we've covered so far and 1:27:58.760 --> 1:28:02.519 sometimes a sneak peek at what's coming up at least 1:28:02.520 --> 1:28:06.040 in the week to follow. We're primarily a science podcast here, 1:28:06.040 --> 1:28:08.360 it's Stuff to Blow Your Mind with core episodes on 1:28:08.400 --> 1:28:11.040 Tuesdays and Thursdays, but on Fridays we set aside most 1:28:11.040 --> 1:28:13.679 serious concerns to just talk about a weird film film 1:28:13.680 --> 1:28:16.439 here on Weird House Cinema. Follow us on social media 1:28:16.720 --> 1:28:20.720 if you use social media. On Instagram, we are STBYM 1:28:20.800 --> 1:28:23.880 podcast and I have to say that the social media 1:28:23.920 --> 1:28:27.080 team has been putting up some cool like trailer audio 1:28:27.160 --> 1:28:30.240 visual trailer samples of the films covered on Weird House, 1:28:30.240 --> 1:28:32.240 so that's another place where you can get a little 1:28:32.280 --> 1:28:34.639 taste of the movie we're talking about each week. 1:28:34.960 --> 1:28:38.559 Huge thanks as always to our excellent audio producer JJ Posway. 1:28:38.880 --> 1:28:40.439 If you would like to get in touch with us 1:28:40.439 --> 1:28:42.960 with feedback on this episode or any other, to suggest 1:28:42.960 --> 1:28:44.920 a topic for the future, or just to say hello, 1:28:45.000 --> 1:28:47.559 you can email us at contact at Stuff to Blow 1:28:47.600 --> 1:28:55.360 your Mind dot com. 1:28:55.520 --> 1:28:58.439 Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For 1:28:58.520 --> 1:29:01.320 more podcasts from My Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, 1:29:01.479 --> 1:29:04.240 Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.