AUTOMATA
DIRECTOR: Gabe Ibanez
CAST: Antonio Banderas, Brigitte Sorensen, Dylan McDermott, Robert Forster, Tim Mcinnerny, Melanie Griffith
CLASSIFICATION: 13 LV
RUNNING TIME: 110 minutes
RATING: **
THE overwrought, uncontrolled sci-fi thriller Autómata is a disappointing example of a film that lacks the imagination to follow through persuasively on its engaging initial premise.
Featuring Banderas as a hero whose bravery in putting his name to the project as producer and lead far outstrips any valour he displays in the film itself, this is one dystopian drama that goes up in flames about midway despite solid work initially and a lively sense of visuals.
Autómata’s achievements are at the level of intention, rather than execution: with this brave stab at a notoriously difficult genre, Banderas and director Ibanez are to be praised for at least trying to take things outside the comfort zone on a low budget.
It is the year 2044, and if things indeed decline as rapidly over the next 30 years as Autómata would have us believe, then we’ll be in a sorry state indeed. Information overload titles inform us that Earth is radioactive, that the global population is a mere 21 million, that there has been technical regression, and that corporate-produced robots have been developed to protect us not only from radioactivity, but also from ourselves. Insurance agent Vaucan (Banderas) is called in by an angry father after the family pooch has been killed by one of the robots, suggesting that a supposedly unalterable protocol inside the melon-headed droid has been breached.
Sensing that the corporation for which they work is facing big trouble, Vaucan’s boss, Bob (Forster), tells him to sort it out.
Vaucan’s partner is the pregnant Rachel (Sorensen), which is about all we learn of her. Vaucan wants to escape with Rachel to the sea, which at times of crisis appears to him in little flashes.
Vaucan goes in search of the truth, making dangerous forays beyond the city limits and encountering Dr Dupre (Griffith), who is working with a self-repairing robot, called Chloe.
Chloe is the film’s main female character, and she’s a lot of fun: if only the script had spent as much time on making its people as believable – and, in a couple of cases, as likeable – as the newly self-aware, soft-voiced bots who have escaped their control.
Visually, Autómata is solidly and sometimes spectacularly conceived, at least until its final stretch. Autómata knows it’s a B-movie, but even B-movies need some sort of control if they aren’t to become simply Bad Movies.
The last half-an-hour of the film has Vaucan being dragged through a radioactive wilderness by robots, all claims to credibility and subtlety lost over its final reel, as its makers hope that the sound of gunfire will deafen us to the failings of a script struggling to reach a satisfactory close. – Hollywood Reporter
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