OT: "I, Robot"

Am Montag, 26. Juli 2004 20:02 schrieb Steve H.:

If you thought about the book: Read it, it is very nice!

If you thought about the movie: Do not watch it, unless you can stand the fact that it has NOT much do do with the book. I might be wrong but I think the makers of the movie just wanted to use the great name of the book -- if not any other title would have done as well.

But of course: That's just my 2 pence. :-)

Karl-Heinz

--=20 Karl-Heinz Zimmer I n d e V i e w K D E F=F6hren Presentations Beyond Limitations Conquer your Desk= top

They should have chosen another title because it has nothing to do with the classic short story. I might have called it Rise Of The Robots if there didn't already exist a video game by that name.

- NeoRenegade

I agree. At one point in the movie they actually attribute the 3 Laws to someone other than Asimov, which I think is rather rude considering the movie is supposedly based on his book. Some have actually organized a boycott of the movie, which I didn't hear about until after I saw it.

Vague spoiler warning:

Those points aside, the plot's pretty nonsensical. For instance, Will Smith's character has a "deep distrust" of robots because a robot saved his life. Furthermore, being only able to save one person, the robot choose him over a young girl as he was more likely to survive. I just don't buy that motivation. Talk about ingratitude.

Oh, and in the future you can't simply erase data. You need to "eat" it with nanites. Go figure.

And conscious AI will be the result of "unexplained anomalies in the code", whatever that means.

And when you die, your house is demolished for no particular reason.

Overall, if you're looking for a thoughtful insight into artificial intelligence, read one of Asimov's books. If you're looking for mindless eye-candy with Will Smith shooting stuff, go see I Robot.

If you are talking about Susan Calvin inventing the 3-laws, that's who Asimov said invented them.

At least that's the story in one of the late-late _Foundation_ books.

said invented them.

No, the movie attributes them to Dr. Alfred Lanning.

Asimov said invented them.

I really wish someone would do a movie of Foundation instead of robots AGAIN. Robots are great n' all, but I think Psychohistory and the Foundation saga is one of Asimov's greater creations.

Lanning or Calvin, the movie -- like the book -- would attribute the laws to a fictional character. It isn't off-base for the movie to change the attribution of the laws. It wasn't all that consistent in Asimov's books.

Funnily enough, Asimov himself hated the title "I, Robot." It was already taken when his publisher cribbed it from another set of authors. Compare the movie I, Robot to the works of the same name by Eando Binder (especially the story The Trial of Adam Link). Look also for an Outer Limits episode, of the same name, based on the Binder story.

The title of the movie is perfectly acceptable, though it's based as much an Binder as Asimov.

-- Gordon Author: Constructing Robot Bases, Robot Builder's Sourcebook, Robot Builder's Bonanza

Yup, the book is a must.

That is true, although the movie AS A MOVIE unto itself isn't bad at all. Not amazing, but a fun watch. I found the number of MATRIX scenes they duplicated was amusing (motorcycle jumps; tall monolithic towers; dark scenery...)

Those were for eating they synapsis, weren't they?

That was because the company (who owned the house) wanted to get rid of all evidence ASAP. They owned it.

I think that'd be the "Bad Boyz" series of movies. This was better than that.

I paid for one movie ticket; I may get the DVD on sale...

Regards, Dave

The amount of information in IR could have been condensed into a 15 min movie. Its a fun watch, but not worth the hype at all.

Personally, I thought the scenery was fairly bright and optimistic, far from the Gothic dilapidation in the Matrix.

Same difference.

Couldn't they just have removed or erased the computers? Seems somewhat wasteful to destroy a whole mansion just to cover up the "evidence". And what ever happened to that damn cat?

Fair enough.

Belonged to the neighbor, a Mr Schrodinger I think..

Yes, we are not sure if it is still in the trunk, or even alive. If we don't open the trunk, we will never know.

Cheers!

Sir Charles W. Shults III, K. B. B. Xenotech Research

Actually, IIRC, in the "Robot" books, Lanning was who Calvin worked for when she was a grad student. She was his assistant when Lanning demo'd the first robot with speech capability. I can't recall if the Three Laws were explicitly credited to him, but it's not beyond possibility. I don't Calvin was a founding force of USR, though she did become part of the company early in its history. There's been quite a bit of discussion of this over in re.arts.sf.written lately. Someone there could probably settle the question more definitively.

Typical Will Smith movie....typical aborted Hollywood attempt at a classic novel-to-movie project. All action, no content...at least not much in my opinion. Of course being an Asimov purest I'm going to be harsh but even average Joe audience will pick up on the all thrills, no content aspect of the movie. But hey, what does Hollywood care, they made their money back in about 2 days so no harm done, right? But I will admit that I'll be the first to buy it on DVD when it's released....I'm a sucker that way. I just like to collect that stuff. SRGrimm