When
a renowned scientist (James Cromwell) is found dead, robophobic
detective Del Spooner (Will Smith) suspects an advanced robot
committed the murder. According to the Three Laws of Robotics,
however, a robot can't harm a human. As Spooner investigates he
mysteriously finds himself marked for death, and later must team with
another scientist (Bridget Monahan) to bring down a possible robot
revolution against humans.
CRITIQUE
I, Robot is a fun summer action film
set in a believable future (2035 Chicago), and to the credit of
director Alex Proyas (Dark City), director of photography Simon
Duggan, and the film's special effects team the film looks absolutely
terrific. The script is straight-forward in the way it presents the
main story, but there is a good amount of suspense as well. I,
Robot features several cool action scenes that are
visually very exciting.
THE VIDEO
Fox Home Entertainment
presents I, Robot in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen. Picture
quality and colors look very good. Detail and sharpness appear in
good shape, and no major flaws are present, though a little grain
appears during dark scenes. Overall a great transfer.
THE AUDIO
Audio is available in
5.1 Dolby Digital Surround and 5.1 DTS, as well as Spanish and
French dub tracks. Dialogue and sound effects are clear and easy
to understand with very good surround performance from the rear
speakers. Optional subtitles include English and Spanish.
THE EXTRAS
Disc 1:
Carried over from
the first release is the commentary by director Alex Proyas and
screenwriter Akiva Goldsman and the 16-minute making-of
featurette. The commentary is decent with some informative
comments here and there.
New to this edition
are two additional commentaries: one with production designer
Patrick Tatopolous, editor Richard Learoyd and the visual effects
team, and the other with composer Marco Beltrami. The
technical track was interesting while the composer offered his
thoughts on the music. Rounding out the extras is an X-Men 2
DVD trailer and a still gallery.
Disc 2:
In an interesting
move the DVD gives you the option of playing the entire disc or
selecting various "unique features" from a menu. Navigating the
features isn't too hard but it's not simple either.
Days Out of Days
is a 9-part production diary running approximately 100 minutes
that takes you on the set of the movie. Presented in anamorphic
widescreen, the footage is nice to watch but the scenes are
presented in random order so there is no real sense of progression
of the production. This should've been better edited. Each chapter
in this documentary is divided into sub-chapters that start off
with brief introductions by Alex Proyas.
CGI and Design
is a 5-part documentary running approximately 34 minutes that
looks at the creation of the robots and the major visual effects.
Presented in anamorphic widescreen, this is an interesting extra
to watch.
Sentient Machines
presents a 35-minute discussion by several scientists and other
people on robotic behavior and what's (possibly) in store in the
future.
Three Laws Safe
is a 30-minute documentary presented as four featurettes in
anamorphic widescreen about the development of the project and
much more featuring interviews with the screenwriters (Jeff
Vintar, Goldsman) and two associates (daughter and editor) of
Robert Asimov.
Filmmaker's
Toolbox divides into three sections based on the effects
companies that created the special effects. Offered are effects
breakdowns from Digital Domain (6 mins), WETA Digital (5 mins)
and Rainmaker (5 1/2 mins) which focus on just how many different
layers of effects went into some of the scenes. Also featured are
four deleted scenes including two alternate endings (one
complete, the other in pre-viz stage) that run an aggregate of six
minutes.
There are also some
Easter eggs hidden in-between the menu navigations. One
very brief clip showed the tunnel chase scene with two "toasters"
chasing Spooner's car.
FINAL THOUGHTS
I, Robot is a
fun and intriguing sci-fi picture. This new DVD edition features
cool extras that should've been available the first time around.
If you own the previous release I recommend an upgrade based on
the extras.
