(2001)

review by:

12-29-03

Written by: Brad Abraham and Joseph O'Brien Directed by: Julian Grant Starring: Page Fletcher, Maurice Dean Wint, Maria del Mar

An aging Robocop and his old partner John T. Cable must hunt down Bone Machine, a crazed vigilante, on the streets of Delta City. Meanwhile, his son James Murphy, now an OCP executive, is being inducted into The Trust, a secret group aiming to overthrow OCP's executive board. I was excited to hear this movie existed. A new Robocop! And it's part of a four movie miniseries! And it looks low-budget and campy! It has to be good (or at least enjoyable), right? Well, it was...something. The story for Robocop: Prime Directives - Dark Justice (or Robocop 4) is pretty much the usual thing. Robo is once again hunting a bigger, better thingy with guns. As always, he gets reprogrammed halfway through the movie and has to cleverly deal with new directives. It worked before, it'll work again, right? Well, only if you guys are trying to make another throwaway, popcorn flick. Robocop 4 treads over familiar ground, with half the funds. Low-budget isn't bad (this is Phantom Films), but whoever thought this movie could even hold a candle to its predecessors, using the same old crap with half the quality, obviously doesn't enjoy the Robocop series. I mean, there's really no reason for this movie to exist. It's not particularly great, and not quite bad enough to be that other kind of great. It's just..."bleh." And Robo doesn't like being lukewarm. Here's the basic breakdown of the Bad: the writing, direction, and acting are mediocre. The flashback scenes are excruciating to watch. The villain (Bone Machine) looks stupid. And the action scenes are more boring than a freezer full of constipated monkeys. And the...Ok: The special effects, especially the establishing shots of the OCP building, are low quality and cheesy. This provides amusement when the movie's boring the all-holy crap out of you. The only inherently good thing about Robocop 4 (spoiler coming on), is the teasing of Brother Robocop who will show up in the next movie. Yup, it's another Robo, but this guy's black. And his suit is dark and shiny. Whoever claims to be unamused by Robocop Light vs. Robocop Dark probably doesn't share our sense of humor... Basically, this movie kicks the groin of a once respectable franchise. If (the very bad) Robocop 3 was the killing of the series, Robocop 4 is the exhuming and defiling of the body. And the fact that it's one of four is simply...necrophilia. Having said that, I know I'll see all these movies. There's a chance that among all four lies a somewhat interesting story, and maybe Dark Justice is just the slow beginning. Maybe. But I really just want to see black Robo kickin' some ass...with soul.

AKA: Robocrap          A Fistful of Dollars...Could Make This Movie Better

Rating