Bicentennial Man (1999)
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Bicentennial Man (1999)
The saga of a robot, built in the year 2005 (about a decade before I posted this, apparently), and his odyssey over the next 200 years to become more and more human. And there's the rub. In my opinion, he was just fine as he was in the beginning, before eventually transmuting into a well-known comedian (Robin Williams) of the 20th century. The other problem is that, as mentioned, the film covers 2 centuries of time; even at 2+ hours, that doesn't leave much leeway for the story to stay very long in each decade. So, you have the inevitable hop-hop pace as the film skitters to the climax. You see a few minutes, for example, of the way things are 30 years from now; then, a couple of minutes around the year 2060, and so on. And on. It does go on, and in not a very thrilling manner for what should be exciting stuff. The director, Chris Columbus, relies on patented schmaltzy observations of shallow depth, with no sense of the complexities of life (there's no time). It also places huge importance on Bi-Man being recognized as a true human being, at the same time designating divine standing on being a human and that this divinity depends on what other people think - a confusing position. We end up with the moral that we are all meant to die, and die quick, but what kind of life is there before that? The movie gives no clue. It just waves bye-bye to us somberly. BoG's Score: 5.5 out of 10
Bicentennial Trivia:
a couple of years later, Robin Williams would provide his voice for one scene in the similar A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001)
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