Spielberg more than a ghost in this shiny machine

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This article was published 07/10/2011 (5482 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

For such a simple, crowd-pleasing story, there is a complicated lineage behind the movie Real Steel.

Executive producer Steven Spielberg generated this movie almost a decade ago, basing it loosely upon the ’50s short story Steel by the great sci-fi writer Richard Matheson (who gave Spielberg the basis for his own brilliant TV movie debut, Duel.)

In Real Steel, the only thing that really survives of Matheson’s story is the premise: Boxing between humans is illegal, so a few years into the future, fights are staged between specialized warrior robots. The violence of the bouts is actually worse than Mike Tyson in full biting mode: It’s quite all right if a warrior punches his opponent’s head clean off. In fact, that kind of thing is encouraged. And no one gets hurt. In theory.

Charlie (Hugh Jackman) is an ex-boxer who has parlayed his skills into acting as a promoter-trainer for a series of mechanized palookas. It’s a sketchy business, made sketchier by the fact Charlie is a compulsive gambler.

Needing money to finance his next fighter, Charlie sees a silver cloud in the sudden demise of his ex-girlfriend. She has left behind their son. Charlie, the absentee father, visits the angry young Max (Dakota Goyo) and negotiates a deal with the boy’s rich uncle Marvin (James Rebhorn): uncontested custody for $50,000. The catch is that Marvin and his wife (Hope Davis) are leaving for a European vacation, leaving Charlie to actually spend some time with the boy for the first time in his life.

After some initial relationship abrasion, the two discover a mutual passion for robotics. And during an illicit midnight forage in a robot junkyard it is Max who discovers a discarded sparring ‘bot named Atom. It is love at first sight. And before long, the cynical Charlie realizes that getting on Atom’s team may help repair the rift that exists between himself and his son.

The film is directed by Shawn Levy from a script by John Gatins, but Spielberg’s fingerprints are all over this shiny machine. Notably, the visual effects are excellent, with the computer-generated fighting robots given the gleam and weighty presence of real machines. And where early Spielberg movies often refer to an absent or remote father, this movie puts the absent father front and centre.

Indicative of Spielberg’s more calculated side, the movie also constitutes a response to the Transformers movies Spielberg exec-produced for director Michael Bay. Where all the Transformers movies are all impressive, empty spectacles about giant fighting robots, Real Steel offers both the spectacle and the emotional human core the Transformers movies so sorely lack.

Fortunately, that sense of calculated counter-programming isn’t especially apparent in the film. Jackman actually gives his character a little extra grit by virtue of the fact Charlie is sorely lacking in virtue. In fact, he’s an unrepentant jerk for much of the film.

Likewise, director Levy doesn’t overplay the futurist card, concentrating on making something that doesn’t distract us with Blade Runner affectations. This is a big, solid family movie right down to its final championship punch-up.

The winner of the climactic bout? Steven Spielberg, of course.

randall.king@freepress.mb.ca

Other Voices

Excerpts from reviews of Real Steel:

A toy tie-in, an overlong movie that takes on some of the grimy veneer and colorful characters of a “boxing picture,” sanitizing it for children.

— Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel

A tremendous technical polish is brought to bear upon what is frequently a rather awkward grafting of family drama and overblown, futuristic boxing tale.

— Brent Simon, Screen International

It’s hard to buy into the notion that fans could ever be as rabid to watch a couple of machines tear each other apart as they are to see two men sweating and straining and bleeding on the canvas. Without human consequence, where’s the drama?

— David Germain, Associated Press

The movie really comes to life during the marvellous boxing sequences, which are often drop-dead exciting.

— Randy Cordova, Arizona Republic

This punishingly predictable tale will test whether sci-fi action fanboys can stomach having their cherished genre infiltrated by sentimental hokum about a down-on-his-luck dad and his spunky long-lost son.

— Todd McCarthy, Hollywood Reporter

Compiled by Shane Minkin

MOVIE REVIEW

Real Steel

Starring Hugh Jackman

Grant Park, Kildonan Place, Polo Park, St. Vital, Towne

PG

127 minutes

3 stars out of five