REVIEW : Chappie (2015)

Can we all just take a moment and talk about Chappie? (Or CHAPPiE, as the film likes to call itself) One day before going into it, I was surprised to find that there were no reviews or anything on the Internet. It was only after the movie when I learned that there was a review embargo of some sorts so that those who have watched it are not allowed to talk about it before it is officially released. And I understand why that embargo was in place.

Because if reviews were to appear before the movie was actually released, not many would have watched it.

Chappie is set in a Johannesburg where the streets are policed by droids a la Robocop. Deon Wilson (Dev Patel) is the creator of these "Scouts" and eventually he finds a way to give his robots a consciousness, an actual artificial intelligence. But when his proposal to just test his idea gets shut down by the CEO of the company he works for, Deon decides to steal a damaged robot to carry on with his experiment.

Unfortunately, he gets kidnapped on his way home, with stolen property in the back of his van. The kidnappers are gangstas (ends with an 'a', not 'er') America (Jose Pablo Cantillo), Ninja and Yolandi (played by Ninja and Yolandi from Die Antwoord) who have gotten themselves into burning hot water and decide that the only way out of it was to stage a heist. But first, they would need to find a way to shut down the Scouts. Thus, the kidnapping.

However, when they realise the decommissioned machine in the back of the van and the possibilities posed by Deon's idea, Yolandi and Ninja decides to adopt the robot instead. Thus, Chappie is born.

Meanwhile, back in the office, Deon has an adversary in the form of Vincent Moore (Hugh Jackman) who builds a Ceph Pinger-like machine that fails to get the recognition and attention Deon's Scouts have. For some reasons that I don't understand, Hugh Jackman dresses up like a zookeeper in this film, besides also being the dumbest villain I have ever seen.

Crysis's Ceph Pinger on the left; Chappie's "The Moose" on the right

Here's what I do like about Chappie: I like the robot, because scenes with it are the only scenes I find truly entertaining. It's funny and it showed so much emotion that it felt human enough. But mostly it's a funny little thing, naive, clueless and childlike.There's one part in the movie where Chappie is tricked into thinking that it's taking back Daddy Ninja's cars from people who stole them, when in fact it was just carjacking.

Yolandi has a pink version of the same gun, if you're wondering.

Here's what I don't like about Chappie: everything else. Chappie feels like a family sci-fi film without being family-friendly. You have themes of love, of doing what's right and knowing what's wrong, of parenting albeit bad parenting. But then you also have people (read: Ninja) cursing like he's a thirteen-year-old living the #thuglife, violent scenes of people getting shot at, and even one death that is nothing but gruesome. Some other points that grate on my nerves are:

• The other characters are very single minded and there's really only one facade to each of their personalities.
• The script made me cringe more than once--although Chappie's lines are sometimes adorably funny, other times they're still cheesy.
• There are more plot holes I can count among other things that either do not make sense, or is outright idiotic. 
• I do not understand why the Die Antwoord duo were cast because it was awful to sit through their performances, They're rappers/singers, not actors. Patel was just okay. Hugh Jackman was a complete PitA but that's more of the fault of the character itself than him.

I seriously have no idea how anyone can pull this off in the office without getting their asses fired immediately.

While Chappie could have been a great platform to properly discuss about artificial intelligence. the future of it and the good and the bad, but director Neill Blomkamp wasted a big idea by given it a hollow inside. The only thing I kept seeing was the reinforcement that Chappie has feelings. I do wish that more thought could have been given when the script was written, and not just filling the entire movie with banal tropes found in stories written by a kid.

But who knows, maybe I'm being too harsh on the movie. I did go in with some degree of expectations because the trailer seemed promising, so maybe here's me being bitterly disappointed. So if you intend on watching Chappie, it's better to either go in with the bar set real low or with no expectations at all. Maybe then it would be an enjoyable experience.

After Chappie and Jupiter Ascending, I'm really prepared to swear off the sci-fi genre for a while

I rate it : 4/10 stars

THE GOOD : Chappie the robot.

THE BAD : Chappie the movie.

WATCH IT IF YOU...

• ...don't already have that great of an expectation for this movie. 
• ...have someone who shares the same tastes and can laugh off the silly/ridiculous moments in the movie with you. 
• ...are just a blockbuster, action-movie fan.
• ...like Transformers, but maybe with less fighting.

CHAPPIE (2015) 

Genre : Action Sci-fi  

Runtime : 120 minutes 
Director : Neill Blomkamp 

Cast : Sharlto Copley, Dev Patel, Hugh Jackman