Real Steel
Dir: Shawn Levy
2011
*
I feel sorry for the clever computer special effects people, their brilliant work is ultimately ruined thanks to an awful story, awful acting and awful direction. The general idea is sound but a near distant future where Robot boxing has taken over from Human boxing ultimately due to peoples blood-lust doesn't really work for obvious reasons. A post-apocalyptic future, where people build and fight robots would have been a much better film in my opinion. At least then the father/son setting could have been helped along with a 'fighting for survival' undercurrent. Alas, what we are left with is an unimaginative, unlikely and boring father/son story/mess, cue annoying kid in need of haircut, cue a lot of people shouting 'Yeeeaahh' and punching the air, cue crowds of overacting background stereotypes, etc etc. This is bad film making. It's not My Iron Giant, although the robot looks very much like it, it's not Rocky either, boxing is violent but whether you like it or not, it is very passionate, this film has no passion, not the sort that made Rocky great anyway. All of what should have been the good bits, the more important bits, were all part of a lazy montage. Utter crap. One star for the brilliant computer effects, nothing for the rest. What do you expect though, this is a Shawn Levy film after all.