RoboCop

Did you know that Criterion has a DVD for the first RoboCop? (They did a laser disc back when people didn't buy laser disks.) Watched the thing twice last night. Movie was better than I remembered (gotta love that ED 209), and without all the MPAA edits, twice as violent.

The violence was disturbing (for my lengthy definition of what I find disturbing scroll down and read my "Sin City" post. Keep in mind while reading it -- I liked that movie) but I liked RoboCop because it fell into the five film genres that I love:

1. Gangster Epic ("Once Upon A Time in America," "GoodFellas," "Heat")
2. Southern Gothic ("Eve's Bayou," "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil," "Feats of All Saints")
3. Anything with Johnny Depp or Robert De Niro in it (Someone make a film with Depp and De Niro so I can die happy already!)
4. The Jazz Age/Harlem Renaissance ("Chicago," "The Cotton Club," "Pennies From Heaven")
5. I've Seen the Future and the Future is Fascist! ("RoboCop," "Brazil," "Starship Troopers")

I have some fav subgenres; "Musicals (Carmen Jones)," "Cartoon Anything (Aqua Teen Hunger Force)," "Psycho Bitches You Love (All About Eve)" and "Crappy Black Films of the 1990s and 80s (Anything with Allen Payne ... man, I LOVE Allen Payne!)" but they often overlap into the five main categories.

Like "Aeon Flux" is a Sci-Fi-Fascism toon starring a Psycho Bitch You Love. Julie Taymor's "Titus" is Shakespeare's "OG" -- the "Original Gangster Epic" featuring yet another Psycho Bitch You Love with a nice Sci-Fi-Fascism undercurrent. It also stars an actor from my "Crappy Black Films of the 1990s and 80s" collection, Harry J. Lennix. (I LOVE Harry J!)

Now make me a fascist 1920s futuristic gangster epic with Johnny Depp and De Niro playing a pair of southerners and I'm there!

You know? Like Spielberg/Kubrick's "AI" -- only watchable. Or "Westworld."

You know? But better.

Anyway, "RoboCop" is an integral part of my Sci-Fi-Fascism collection which includes my favorite SFF flick Terry Gilliam's "Brazil," the action comedy "Demolition Man" and the under-rated Verhooven sex n' violence bonaza "Starship Troopers." I really hate Fascism, but enjoy it within the safety of a movie as SFF's tend to represent a slightly more "believable" version of the future to me. (As opposed to "AI" which is kind of like "SFF For Limp Wristed Pansies.") A good SFF has to have something about it that's just inherently rotten and messed up. Like even though "Demolition Man" is the least dark of my SFF's it still involves a guy who is frozen for a crime he didn't commit and wakes up into a future where everyone he loves is dead.

But the best ones feature the whole "no hope at all" aspect to it. (As Fascism kills all hope. Otherwise you're like, "Fascism really can't be that bad! Look how clean the city is and free of crime! Sure, a cop just executed a man right in front of us but the cleaning droid will get it!") Like how in "RoboCop" Murphy and Lewis are so never getting it on since he's been turned into a metal monster and has to make the best of what he's got left, which is crime fighting and not much else. Or how "Brazil" ends with a frontal lobotomy. Or how Spielberg totally should have ended "Minority Report" twenty minutes early. He did "Schindler's List" and hasn't been able to see the sinister side of things ever since. Dude, SFF is dark, man! Dark! No hope! Get that hope out of there!

Anyway, I'm looking for SFF films I haven't seen (I've seen a lot of them.) Any suggestions? I'm going to finally watch "Total Recall" but I have a prejudice against Arnold films that I have to get over first.

But it's a Paul Verhooven film and he's a sick, demented mo-fo. It can't be that bad.