Surrogates (2009)

In the not too distant future, technology allows humans to live their lives through robots they call surrogates. Humans have in effect cocooned themselves in their homes, never venturing outside. Rather, they explore life through their surrogates who may or may not resemble them. Tom Greer and his partner Peters are FBI agents assigned to investigate the destruction of two surrogates that has also caused the unthinkable: the human hosts were also killed. The use of surrogates is not universally endorsed with some humans living in technology and machine-free zones. Led by a man called The Prophet, the fear is that they have put their hands on a weapon that would fundamentally change human society. Greer believes they have also put their hands on a weapon that could fundamentally change society, though he begins to wonder if that might be a good thing.


Although I couldn't put my finger on it, it seemed like Surrogates was cobbled together from elements from other movies I've seen before. Everything felt recycled, you'll recognize many other movies in this one including "I Robot", "Gamer", "The Matrix", "Strange Days", "Virtuosity", "Harsh Realm" (I know, thats a TV show) and more. The ending was cliche and you'll see it coming a mile away, and the tropes are free flowing throughout. (hint: everyone with a surrogate has bad skin). Most of the criticisms I have of this movie are trivial, as it was overall pretty watchable and not too painful, but the core plot point was so ludicrous it should have been rejected and sent back for rewrite. The antagonist wants to purge the dependency on surrogates, so his solution is to murder 98% of the worlds population through the surrogates, instead of just destroying the surrogates themselves. There's no mention that he even considered that possibility, even though the fat IT geek comes up with that solution on a few seconds notice. Even if I could accept that our badguy was just a jerk, and wanted to exterminate the human race, I cannot get past the point of wondering how did 98% of the human population AFFORD to buy/operate surrogtes in the first place? Half the worlds population can't even get clean drinking water. All they needed to do was ratchet that percentage down to credible range, but no.


As much as I'm a fan of Bruce Willis, this movie was just "okay" for me. Other people I've talked to didn't like it. Other still loved it. So, it could go either way, which is why I got it right in the middle.


***/*****


3/5 Stars