Neil Blomkamp’s new weirdness comes out tomorrow~! This the dude who brought you District 9 and Elysium. It’s safe to say, he’s mastered making robots seem real, heavy, solid and powerful. Chappie is going to rub some people wrong, because it’s hard to see the ridiculous hipster aspects of the aesthetic make room for the deep philosophical questions. The movie is funny but also bleak and… well…. like I said, if you saw this guy’s other movies you might be able to take a guess at the tone. Some people doubt thge movie’s viability but if there is a selling point to be had here, it is that exact off-the-beatned-path-yness. Chappie gets low brow, gutter, gangster and raw. It also gets smart, sincere and touching. Every so often a robot appeals to the audience in a way that makes us envision a future outside of the terminator plotline’s Skynet. There is C3-PO, Wall-E and now there is Chappie.
So, like, parts of the movie have the mega-violence you’;ve come to expect in Blomkamp movies, but there is a quaint, lovable side to this robot that doesn’t seem out of place in the movie, even though the description might sound in-congruent. Clearly, this movie is not apologizing for the future it paints. It’s challenging and almost offending the audience with it’s demeanor and the way it carries expectations. This film rocks the violence and comedy in a serious mosaic that a fan of true violence, like Tarantino sword fights, will freak out over.
Oh, yeah, and Die Antword are all up in this flick, teaching the adorable robot to be a bad ass motherfucker.
Die Antword do a great job being total dicks, which is, like, their thing. They are cast as themselves. Blomkamp has directed the duo’s weird, South African Rap videos in the past, but this is the first time they will appear in feature-length movie roles. Just like most of Die Antowrd’s carreer, there is not even a hint that there is anything appropriate about them being in this movie, despite the idea of White Rappers hailing from South Africa, one of the most race-volatile countries on the planet. Putting the married-couple-turned rap superstars in a movie like this could have overshadowed the robot plot but it somehow works. Die Antword somehow blundered their way through this in a way that compliment’s their career, too.
I don’t want to give away any spoilers but you gotta see this thing. I’m dying to see how it does in the box office~!
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Jonathan Howard
Jonathan is a freelance writer living in Brooklyn, NY |