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I, Robot (PG-13)
20th Century Studios; Asimov Wiki; IMDb; Rotten Tomatoes; TV Tropes; Wikipedia
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This came out in 2004, but I didn't see it until 2022. It's vaguely inspired by the robot stories of Isaac Asimov, some of which were collected in a book called "I, Robot" in 1950. (I haven't read it, but I might like to. Though I've probably read some if not all of the stories in other collections.) Basically the only things from those stories to appear in this movie are the concept of the Three Laws of Robotics, and the existence of a robo-psychologist named Dr. Susan Calvin (played here by Bridget Moynahan). It's mainly a sci-fi action movie, but also a detective story.

It's set in Chicago in 2035. Will Smith plays police detective Spooner, who has a prejudice against robots, which are prevalent in society at that point. The reason for his prejudice is explained later in the film, and I found it somewhat interesting, as motivations go. It's certainly a twist, which has to do with the death of a young girl. I suppose you could call it survivor's guilt. Anyway, one day a roboticist named Dr. Alfred Lanning (James Cromwell) dies of an apparent suicide, but Spooner believes he was killed. And the suspect turns out to be a (CGI) robot called Sonny (voiced by Alan Tudyk). Sonny is a model NS-5, the latest model from U.S. Robotics, where Doctors Lanning and Calvin work(ed), and USR is about to release a ton of that model, wanting to put a robot in every home. Dr. Calvin, as well as her boss, CEO Lawrence Robertson (Bruce Greenwood), are skeptical of the idea that Sonny could have killed Dr. Lanning, because the first Law of Robotics, which is hardwired into all robots, is that a robot may not injure a human being, or through inaction allow a human being to come to harm. Still, Sonny turns out to be different from the other NS-5's, specially designed by Dr. Lanning himself. So, he is scheduled to be destroyed. But that doesn't stop Spooner's investigation (with reluctant help from Dr. Calvin), and other robots keep trying to kill him. So there's clearly someone else behind whatever's going on, and the main suspect for that is Robertson. Spooner believes Dr. Lanning left him a trail of breadcrumbs to follow, starting with his apparent suicide. But he's eventually relieved of duty by his superior, Lt. Bergin (Chi McBride). Which also doesn't stop Spooner from continuing his investigation.

I don't want to say how it all turns out, but there's a lot of action and some terror, and ultimately I would say an interesting motivation is discovered for the aberrant behavior of the NS-5's, which ties into the Three Laws of Robotics in a way that reminds me of the Zeroth Law, though that isn't mentioned by name in the movie. Anyway, I think the characters of Spooner, Calvin, and Sonny are all decent (but not great). And I do want to mention that at one point, early in the movie, Sonny learns about winking after seeing Spooner do it, which I thought was a bit odd for Spooner to do in that scene, but I did enjoy how it came back later in the movie. I also liked that Dr. Calvin never became a romantic interest for Spooner, because that kind of thing happens far too often in movies for no good reason. (That should be a neutral point for the movie, but because of its rarity it becomes a positive.) And I don't really know what else to say. It's not a really great movie, but it is pretty good.


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