RBR: Real Steel

When there are actual movies being developed on board games like Battleship, you wonder why this film was not called by its inspiration - Rock'em Sock'em robots. In Real Steel, Hugh Jackman plays a washed up boxer who now spends his career fighting robots remotely. Early on in the film he learns he has a son who he must now watch after the boy's mother passes away. Soon the two bond over the constructing and training of a robot named Atom, who may or may not possess skills beyond most robots. If all of this sounds corny and familiar, you're right. The film liberally borrows plot devices and themes from films like Rocky, The Champ, Over the Top and, Transformers. It would be easy to criticize such lazy storytelling, but the problem is that the ideas they use are crowd-pleasers and they work here as well. You can't help but get invested in seeing them form a bond and watch the robot be victorious. And I will definitely give the film credit for visually making the robot fights look very impressive. The biggest drawback of the film is its runtime and usage of that time. There's no reason why this film should have been over two hours long. Subplots involving the boy teaching the robot to dance and a loan shark chasing after Jackman's character seem superfluous and could have easily been edited out of the film. In fact, the time spent on those scenes should have been used to more firmly establish the film's villain. Both the champion robot and its handlers are not developed enough to make us root that hard against them. The finish to the final battle in the film certainly leaves the door wide open for a sequel, so I hope when they make the next film, they correct some of these issues and perhaps delve into more of the science fiction aspects of the story that were only loosely covered in this first outing. This is no cinematic classic, but it uses a tried-and-true formula effectively to make it entertaining. The cast gives good performances (with the exception of the kid who's brash attitude can be grating at times) and the robot battles are a lot of fun. If the subject matter interests you at all, this is definitely worth a rental. Rating: *** 1/2