This week, HBO and Max are going to lose a handful of films, including some that may not have a streaming home after the end of June.
One of those films is RoboCop, the 1987 film that’s widely considered to be among the greatest sci-fi action movies ever made.
RoboCop delivers all of the action that movie lovers could possibly want, and it also offers a story that has depth, compelling characters, humor and heart. Now it’s time to share the reasons why you need to watch this great HBO and Max movie before it leaves this week.
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‘RoboCop’ Has a Surprisingly Powerful Story
The setup for RoboCop seems obvious from the beginning. An ordinary cop in old Detroit named Alex Murphy (Peter Weller) is brutally murdered in the line of duty before being resurrected and rebuilt as RoboCop. Even describing it in that way sounds cheesy, but the movie successfully makes the audience care about Murphy as a man even after he’s transformed into a cyborg.
Screenwriters Edward Neumeier and Michael Miner deserve credit for making the story revolve around Murphy’s internal quest to reclaim his humanity. But it ultimately came down to Weller to make that journey feel real on the screen. Weller projects warmth as Murphy and then seems believably robotic as RoboCop, both in the way he speaks and moves. Large portions of the film require Weller to emote with just his lower jaw and mouth — and he does it beautifully. By the end, the audience isn’t just rooting for RoboCop to kick ass, they also want him to be Alex Murphy again.
This Movie Embodies the ’80s in All the Right Ways
RoboCop is truly a product of its time, which is one of the big reasons why the 2014 remake couldn’t recapture that lightning in a bottle. This is an R-rated action flick that goes beyond what many modern movies would depict on-screen, especially during Murphy’s gruesome murder early in the movie. In turn, RoboCop deals out some pretty brutal justice of his own, and this film earns its rating many times over.
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Although the movie is set in the near future, everything about it screams ’80s from the cutthroat corporate culture at OCP to the way the cops relate to each other. Ronny Cox deserves a special shout out as Dick Jones, the OCP executive who serves as the film’s lead villains. Picture a more ruthless version of Michael Douglas‘ character from Wall Street and it still wouldn’t be as cartoonishly evil as Dick Jones. Cox gets to be the corporate raider that everyone hated from the ’80s, and it’s almost impossible not to enjoy seeing him get what’s coming to him.
The Film’s Satire Is Sharp — and Incredibly Funny
RoboCop‘s unexpectedly hilarious satire largely comes from director Paul Verhoeven, who brought the same comedic edge to Starship Troopers. Verhoeven also went on to direct the infamous Showgirls a few years after RoboCop, but even that film has found its audience decades later thanks to the director’s signature touch. RoboCop’s predecessor, the ED-209, is particularly amusing because it’s both ineffective and horrifyingly lethal at a moment’s notice.
The most impressive aspect of RoboCop is that the film has truly hilarious moments without ever becoming a farce or a self-parody. For example, Kurtwood Smith‘s Clarence Boddicker has some very funny lines, but Smith also gives his character a real sense of menace. Boddicker also personally murders Murphy in the most extreme way possible.
Even RoboCop himself gets some unexpected laughs when he uses his targeting system to shoot a would-be rapist in the genitals. The scene isn’t played for comedy, and yet it’s still funny. Many of RoboCop‘s greatest comedic bits are actually in the faux-TV footage intercut throughout the film. Those moments give the audience a chance to laugh and break the tension before the film throws them back into one of the greatest sci-fi flicks ever made.
RoboCop is streaming on Max until June 30. The 2014 RoboCop movie is also leaving Max on June 30, but that film fundamentally misunderstood why the original was so great.
