Saturday, April 13, 2013

Android (1982)

Directed by: Aaron Lipstadt

Writers: James Reigle, Don Opper, Will Reigle (idea)



It may come as a shock after reading the movie's title, but this one is actually about an android (!), but... wait for it... an android being aware of his own mortality and wanting to escape it, if it's all hum..., sorry, androidly possible. Now where have we seen that before... oh yeah, that obscure Ridley Scott movie that conveniently appeared in theatres just a few months before this one. I'm sure it was just one big coincidence.
 
Be that as it may, Android is a film about Max, who's an android. I'm not exactly sure exactly at which point of the movie are we supposed to realize that, because someone told me that just as the movie started. But anyway, once you see his walk, there's no doubt anymore. Anyone who walks like that can be nothing but android. The movie credits even outrageously claim that Max is played "by himself" (meaning - by a real android), but after checking the IMDb I realized it was not the case - it was actually Don Opper, one of the writers. Darn you, guys, you almost had me fooled!!11
 
Where was I? Oh, yes. Max works and lives on a distant space station where his boss and creator, an excentric dr. Daniel, played by Klaus Kinski, conducts some illegal experiments related to the creation of artificial human life or something (read: androids). For some reason, the good doctor is in a desperate need of a fresh living human female, but those incompetent uneducated bastards from Earth don't know the first thing about science, so they refuse to make the delivery and the good doctor's project is on the way to its demise.
 
Klaus Kinski actually wants to create a female android more perfect than Max, because he belongs to a series that has a slight defect, causing its members to start killing and raping women and stuff. After the successful creation of the female robot, he would shut Max down. However, Max overhears his monologue about this.
 
In the meantime, a group of runaway convicts appears and seeks refuge in the station. Kinski is at first pissed off that Max has let them in, but gets all sweet when he realises that one of them is a woman. After spying on her while she was changing, his instruments show that she's an almost perfect match for what he needs (we are never told what exactly it is). Then various bad stuff happens and many people die, which illustrates the fragility of human life.
 
As you may expect, the acting is mostly horrible, Don Opper and his front teeth look absolutely ridiculous, but at least he gives us a few laughs along the way. The story is unspectacular, but it does the job of keeping you awake and also serves a major plot twist towards the end about which we don't give a rat's ass because we don't care about any of the characters anyway. There's great sexual tension which unfortunately never fully develops into anything concrete, but there is some pointless nudity to make up for that.
 
My favorite thing, of course, is the portrait of the future technology. Serious science fiction films suffer a great deal for that aging thing - as you can't create new technology, you have to use what's available at the moment, even when a movie takes place in distant future. No matter how inventive you are, your film will look ridiculous after twenty years or more - the most obvious example being, say, movies that take place in 2000's in which computers don't appear because the movie was made 30 or 40 years ago. However, I think low budget B-movies actually profit from this, as it adds to their goofy charm. Look at how Max plays a space shooter video game with graphics straight from the early 80's, how the doctor doesn't use a laptop or anything similar but keeps his notes in a good old-fashioned notebook, look at the clothes they're wearing, the portrayal of spaceships, etc. Android is a rather silly movie, but one you'll probably enjoy.
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