BICENTENNIAL MAN review

God I hate it when a studio’s marketing department advertises a film as a complete piece of shit and it’s actually a really really good movie.

The trailers for BICENTENNIAL MAN looked like a trip to a dentist’s office that wasn’t run by Annette Kellerman.... but instead by some fanged tooth sadist.

I have been harboring hopes that this was the... new Chris Columbus... I’d be seeing direct this movie.

You see.. I’ve had this theory about Chris Columbus. There have been two Chris Columbus’ working in Hollywood for the past decade. There’s been the straight-forward... work for the studio... director of Family films (HOME ALONE, HOME ALONE 2, STEPMOM, NINE MONTHS, ETC).... And then there is the Chris Columbus, the cool dude, that has been writing and/or producing (DAREDEVIL, FANTASTIC FOUR, MONKEYBONE, GREMLINS, YOUNG SHERLOCK HOLMES, LITTLE NEMO: ADVENTURES IN SLUMBERLAND, THE GOONIES, etc).

I was hoping that cool Columbus was going to finally emerge from his cocoon and be the geek director I’ve been waiting for. I mean... when he chose STEPMOM over FANTASTIC FOUR... I swear... my heart nearly broke. It’s been my theory that Columbus has been directing competent entertainment for the studios to acheive a degree of power in the industry with which he could then make the cool movies he always wanted to make. Or at least that was my belief.

Then the trailers for BICENTENNIAL MAN showed up and it looked as if Columbus had turned Nicholas Kazan’s wonderful screenplay that I had read into MRS DOUBTFIRE: THE FOILED EDITION. Being the optimist that I am, I begin recalling the ocassions where idiotic marketing departments had advertised Robin Williams films as pop-comedies when in actuality they were... quite more (FISHER KING, DEAD POETS SOCIETY, AWAKENINGS, etc). Perhaps, the marketeers at Disney decided that they could reach a larger market by putting out the ‘Comedy Beat’ trailer and suckering that mass audience in with Robin Williams.

Who knows.. perhaps it’ll work. But the film I saw today was not a Robin Williams comedy. There are some comedic parts... But this movie is a film about immortality vs mortality. A story about humanity. A movie concerned with nobility, interracial romance, existence and much more.

It isn’t “The Wild Adventures Of Robo-Robin And The Pepsi Kid”.

For me, this is by far my favorite directoral effort from Chris Columbus. Is it ‘Brilliant’ like one of our earlier spy reviewers said?

Well, that depends on whether or not you realize that DATA is a complete ripoff of Asimov’s writing and that BICENTENNIAL MAN and THE POSITRONIC MAN were written decades before DATA was an inkling in Roddenberry or Berman’s eye. Heck, if memory serves... those stories predate the birth of Brent Spiner.

I liked this film quite a bit. It is... a very very good movie. And when Columbus takes the next step in his directing career... most likely SPIDER-MAN at this point in time... then we will see his next best film. Columbus for me has been a sleeping giant of future cool movies. His scripts for Comic Book films have been amazing collaborations with their respective co-writers... and I’ve been dying for him to... come out of the closet and be the geek director I have been hoping he’d be.

It isn’t a literal adaptation of BICENTENNIAL MAN, but it’s a damn good film of it’s own right.

One of the complaints I have heard has centered around the design of the robot. Frankly... it’s a Robot designed by a corporate entity that intended for it to be a household appliance. Look at you blender... pretty cool huh? That Microwave? It’s the Fonz man, right? And that self-cleaning Fridge?

That’s the angle they took with designing Andrew in this movie. He’s just supposed to be slick and clean looking. To me... he looks about like something some damn corporate robot company would come up with. And... that’s kinda why Andrew wants to grow and change. He isn’t cold and mechanical... Inside him he has a soul, and wishes.

As for the world of the future? Well... it’s pretty spiffy. Nice digital matte paintings, but what I like is while time is moving on... while changes are being made... There isn’t too much RADICAL change. And that’s comforting. Yeah... there’s flying cars and towers and holographic signs.... Actually in a way... this film fits a bit into the BACK TO THE FUTURE universe of the future.... though without that number of corporate endorsements.

The problems with the film? Well... I was kinda hoping for a John Williams score with this film, but didn’t get it. And... well that’s about it for me. I’m sure we’ll hear some kneejerk “Man, that’s like a ripoff of MEASURE OF A MAN from ST:TNG!!! This movie sucks!” stuff... but frankly this egg came before that chicken.

Chris Columbus has some interesting project on his platter next. Like I said earlier, he’s the current Front Runner for SPIDER-MAN, and after this movie... I’m totally ok with that. He’s also got a really wonderful script by Michael B Valle called SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE VENGENCE OF DRACULA that I’m in the midst of reading that he’s rumored to be interested in. As well as those FANTASTIC FOUR and DAREDEVIL projects.

He’s a director for us to begin watching very very very closely. He’s about to wow a bunch of us I think. We’ll see.