Science Fiction

Film review by Jason Day of Surrogates, the 2009 sci-fi thriller set in a future world where perfect-looking, youthful robots live the social and professional lives of their stay at home, older selves. Directed by Jonathan Mostow and starring Bruce Willis, Radha Mitchell and Rosamund Pike.

Synopsis

(Partly from IMDb): Set in a futuristic world where humans live in isolation and interact through surrogate robots, FBI Agent Greer (Bruce Willis) – joined by his partner Peters (Radha Mitchell) – is forced to leave his home for the first time in years to investigate the murders of other people’s surrogates.

Greer still mourns the death of his only child and is separated from his wife Maggie (Rosamund Pike), likewise stuck at home and trying to avoid painful memories.

Review, by @Reelreviewer

There has been a glut of sci-fi films over recent years that are nothing more than mishmashes of former movie glories (Elysium, 2013 that’s a bit of Metropolis and District 9, the Tom Cruise vehicles Oblivion, 2013 and Edge of Tomorrow, 2014 that from my sofa at least appear to be the same film and The Creator, 2023 that tries to be everything, all over the shop and at the same time).

No surprise then Surrogates – which stars actors I would usually pay good money to see but somehow the movie passed completely under my radar – follows suit. It’s a shame that this inauspicious movie, with elements of something narratively fleshier, sports its merits only on the surface.

This unhappy, haphazard mix of The Stepford Wives (the 1976 version), Bladerunner (1982), Minority Report (2002), and when Willis sports a half-robotic arm after hunting a renegade replicant, The Terminator (1984).

It’s cheap and cheerful scriptwriting in contrast to the generous budget (about $80m) from Touchstone, the ‘adult arm’ of Disney. Like its robot characters, played by an array of handsome/beautiful actors, Surrogates looks great, at least on the surface.

Willis, Mitchell, and Pike (in the main image), with waxy make-up, wide, clear eyes, and (in Willis’ case) a boost of CGI-infused youthfulness, are unnervingly watchable. These three are nothing less than watchable most of the time, but in Surrogates, you want to focus on the weird nature of their characters and looks.

The same can’t be said for all, and Surrogates wastes the talents of Ving Rhames and James Cromwell, who appear all too fleetingly as, respectively, an evangelical sage and the surrogates’ creator.

There are arrestingly attractive details in the spick and span production design and two stand out scenes that introduce dark elements to this glisteningly ‘perfect’ world – the nightclub where the surrogates rave using a spasmodic dance style and later, in the Greers’ home, when Maggie’s surrogate friends get high by zapping themselves with electricity – but the promise of such interesting murkiness never gets going.

Surrogates, then, really is just skin deep.

See the trailer for Surrogates (2009).

Cast & credits

Director: Jonathan Mostow. 1hr and 29mins/89 mins. Touchstone Pictures/Mandeville Films/Brownstone Productions/Top Shelf Productions/Wintergreen Productions. (12).

Producers: Max Handelman, David Hoberman, Todd Lieberman.
Writers: Michael Ferris, John Brancato.
Camera: Oliver Wood.
Music: Richard Marvin.
Sets: Jeff Mann.

Bruce Willis, Radha Mitchell, Rosamund Pike, Ving Rhames, Boris Kodjoe, Joe Francis Ginty, James Cromwell, Jack Noseworthy, Devin Ratray, Michael Cudlitz, Jeffrey De Serrano.