Eye Candy #124 - "Surrogates"

Surrogates: In the near future, humanity interacts with one another through robotic, idealized forms, while their real bodies are plugged in at home. While most people use the “surrogate” robots, there are also humans that refuse to. When two surrogates are found destroyed in an alleyway, two FBI agents, Tom Greer (Bruce Willis) and Jennifer Peters (Radha Mitchell), both of whom use surrogates themselves, are called in to investigate because one of the victims in the son of the inventor of the surrogate robots. Soon Greer finds himself at the mercy of forces he doesn’t fully understand as various groups aligned for and against surrogate usage, including Greer’s wife (played by Rosamund Pike), who is addicted to surrogate usage because it is the ultimate self-esteem fix, square off for their own ends. Thematically similar to the recent “Gamer” movie, about identity and potential for technology to let us give in to our best and worst impulses, this film has some flaws. For those that read the comic book series upon which this is based, there are some major deviations, so be prepared. There is an overarching sense of detachment (don’t know if it’s deliberate, but it’s certainly there) makes the characters, even the good guys, largely unsympathetic. It‘s not well cast: Willis is saddled with a true awful hairpiece for the first part of the movie. James Cromwell seems to be playing the same part he played in the movie “I, Robot”. And Ving Rhames look doofy under dreadlocks. The one who actually fairs best is Pike, with a much expanded role as Greer’s wife (in the comic series, she’s an afterthought), the only person through whom the psychological challenges of using a surrogate actually comes through. Visually, it’s unimpressive, as the surrogate characters look deliberately plastic, while the regular humans look dirty and unshaven. Color me unimpressed. Woodchuck sez, “Skip it.”