RoboCop 2
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| RoboCop 2 | |
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 Theatrical release poster |
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| Directed by | Irvin Kershner |
| Produced by | Jon Davison |
| Written by | Screenplay: Frank Miller Walon Green Story: Frank Miller Characters: Edward Neumeier Michael Miner |
| Starring | Peter Weller Nancy Allen Dan O'Herlihy Belinda Bauer John Glover Mario Machado Leeza Gibbons John Ingle Tom Noonan Roger Aaron Brown Gabriel Damon Galyn Görg Mark Rolston Lila Finn John Hateley Gage Tarrant Thomas Rosales, Jr. Brandon Smith Wallace Merck |
| Music by | Leonard Rosenman |
| Cinematography | Mark Irwin |
| Editing by | Armen Minasian Julie Offer Lee Smith Deborah Zeitman |
| Distributed by | Orion Pictures |
| Release date(s) | June 22, 1990 |
| Running time | 117 min. |
| Country |  United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $14,000,000 (estimated) |
| Preceded by | RoboCop (1987) |
| Followed by | RoboCop 3 (1993) |
RoboCop 2 is a 1990 cyberpunk film set in the near future in a dystopian metropolitan Detroit, Michigan. It is the sequel to the 1987 film RoboCop.
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[edit] Plot
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This plot summary may be too long or overly detailed. Please help improve it by removing unnecessary details and making it more concise. (June 2008) |
The main plot of RoboCop 2 is the title character's struggle to regain the humanity that many characters in the film felt he lost when he was turned into RoboCop (a cyborg combining the brain and other tissue from the corpse of a murdered police officer, Alex Murphy, with a primarily robotic body) in the first film.
One sub-plot, introduced at the beginning of the movie, concerns the consequences of RoboCop's realization of his former identity, and his impotent attempt to reach out to his family. Having found out where they moved after he was killed, he drives by their house, greatly distressing his former wife. She eventually complains and threatens to sue OCP, so they allow her to see him. Beforehand, Holzgang (Jeff McCarthy), an OCP lawyer, insistently reminds RoboCop that he could never have his life back as Alex Murphy and that he is a machine. Upon seeing his wife, he tells her that the face was placed on him to honor the dead Alex Murphy and that he is just a machine. Though impassive in the face of her sadness and confusion, he watches intently as she leaves his life forever.
The overarching plot of the movie concerns OCP's attempt to cause the old City of Detroit to default on its debt, so that OCP can foreclose, take over the city government, demolish the old city, and put up a planned community (Delta City) in its place. As part of this plan, it forces a police strike by terminating their pension plan and cutting salaries by 40%. As RoboCop cannot go on strike, this merely increases his duties as the city sinks further into chaos and terror.
Meanwhile, the Security Concepts division of OCP continues to sink tens of millions of dollars into the development of a more advanced and stronger cyborg — a "RoboCop 2." Each project ends up a disaster; once the transformed officers realize what they've become, they immediately turn suicidal (one shoots the scientists around him before killing himself, and another tears its own helmet face off). Murphy only survived and adapted because of his exceedingly strong sense of duty to the law and his moral objection to suicide as an Irish-Catholic. Therefore, the scientists come up with a new idea — a criminal with a similar overcoming desire: a desire for power and immortality, regardless of the cost.
In this movie, RoboCop's primary mission is to deal with the distribution of a powerful designer drug named "Nuke." The primary distributor, Cain (Tom Noonan), appears to have a messiah complex due to his own drug abuse; he believes that Nuke is the way to paradise, and wants to distribute it to the entire city. He is assisted by his girlfriend Angie (Galyn Görg); a foul-mouthed yet competent "ten-year old boy," Hob (Gabriel Damon), whom RoboCop cannot shoot because of his age; and Officer Duffy (Stephen Lee), a corrupt police officer who is controlled by his addiction to Nuke.
Having learned of Cain's involvement in the production of Nuke, RoboCop confronts him and his gang at an abandoned construction site, in which he is rendered immobile and disassembled; the pieces are left in front of the striking officers of the Detroit Police. OCP is reluctant to foot his massive repair costs, and considers shutting him down for good, despite protests from the RoboCop project members and fellow police officers. Later Cain has Duffy tortured to death for divulging their secret hideout to Robocop.
However, RoboCop is saved when Dr. Juliette Faxx (Belinda Bauer), an OCP psychologist who has taken charge of the new RoboCop team, argues for his importance as a figure of the community; through lobbying a panel of private citizens, she creates a list of over 300 new directives to be added to his program. Though resistant at first, Murphy is ultimately powerless to refuse the new commands and is rendered unable to take aggressive action against criminals, even to defend himself. Eventually examined by the original RoboCop team at the police department, a suggestion on how the directives might be cleared leads him to shock himself with electrical current, clearing all the directives (even the initial three). He then declares war on Cain, immediately leading the striking officers off the picket line to attack Cain's hideout.
The plots cross when Cain is badly injured in a battle with RoboCop. Though Angie wants to rescue Cain from the hospital, Hob considers him already dead and moves to take control of the Nuke distribution. Faxx, having decided that Cain has the perfect mindset for the new cyborg, arrives at the hospital and switches off his life support, calling for an immediate brain removal and transplant. Displaying the new RoboCop to the head of OCP, Faxx demonstrates how he may be pacified through a canister of pure Nuke, the only way the pain of Cain's new existence can be dulled.
Meanwhile, Hob, as the new leader of the drug cartel in Old Detroit, arranges a secret meeting with the desperate Mayor Marvin Kuzak (Willard E. Pugh), offering to bail out the city's debt to OCP — but only if the mayor agrees to a hands-off policy regarding the distribution of Nuke. Since this would hinder OCP's attempts to take over the city, the corporation sends RoboCop 2 in for the ostensible purpose of breaking up the drug operation, while actually ordering the cyborg to kill all parties involved. While the mayor, who was prevented from being corrupted by the cartel, escapes through a sewer drain, both his and Hob's bodyguards are slaughtered, as well as Angie and Hob. RoboCop arrives late on the scene, in time to comfort a dying Hob, crushed by his own ill-gotten cash, and be told of RoboCop 2's actions.
The movie ends with a climactic battle between RoboCop and RoboCop 2 during the unveiling of Delta City and the new cyborg at a press conference. The OCP President unwittingly presents a canister filled with Nuke; Cain escapes control and begins to run amok, destroying the control device that arms his weapons, then opening fire on the crowd in desperation for the canister of Nuke. RoboCop, arriving just beforehand and watching to see if Hob was right about RoboCop 2, returns fire.
The two cyborgs battle back and forth throughout the building, eventually falling off the roof and into an underground facility; RoboCop 2 attacks with a welder, but RoboCop directs it towards a gas pipe, causing a large explosion. RoboCop pulls himself up to the street through the hole blown in the pavement, and heads back into the OCP building, his intent unknown. RoboCop 2 emerges in similar fashion, engaging the police in a firefight; Lewis rams him into a wall with an APC, doing little good.
RoboCop then emerges with the canister of Nuke from the press conference. Upon seeing the canister, RoboCop 2 immediately ceases fire and eventually takes the Nuke. While distracted, RoboCop jumps onto his back, punches his way through to Cain's brain, and smashes it onto the pavement.
The Chairman of OCP, executive Johnson (Felton Perry), and lawyer Holzgang (Jeff McCarthy) discuss OCP liability for the massacre, and decide to scapegoat Faxx, claiming that she acted without company support in designing RoboCop 2. Holzgang is confident that he can find evidence against Faxx "whether it exists or not."
In the final scene of the film, Lewis complains about how the OCP executives will escape legally unscathed. RoboCop, removing his visor with a socket wrench, replies: "Patience, Lewis. We're only human."
[edit] Production
RoboCop 2 was directed by Irvin Kershner from a script by Frank Miller and Walon Green. After the success of The Dark Knight Returns, Frank Miller was contacted by producer Jon Davison about writing a sequel to the Davison-produced box-office smash RoboCop, directed by Paul Verhoeven. Miller enthusiastically accepted the offer, eager to make an impression in Hollywood the way he had in comics the past decade. Miller’s screenplay was regarded as an ample follow-up to the original; filled with dark humor, socio-political commentary, and graphic violence.
However, the realities of the Hollywood studio system soon became apparent to Miller. Although he enjoyed being handsomely paid for his contributions, he lamented the fact that he was bombarded by notes from studio execs telling him that his script was “unfilmable.” His script was muted through rewrites, and drastically re-written into what became RoboCop 2. Even when his tenure as screenwriter was officially over, Miller showed up on set everyday, eager to learn all about the movie-making process from start-to-finish. He was even given a cameo as “Frank the chemist.”
Miller would come into contact with the fictional cyborg once more with the critically-acclaimed, best-selling limited series, RoboCop vs. The Terminator. His original screenplay for RoboCop 2 took on an almost “urban legend” status as fans wondered about “what could have been.” Nevertheless, Miller returned to write the script for the third film in the series, RoboCop 3. Miller's original script for RoboCop 2 was later turned into a nine-part comic book series called Frank Miller's RoboCop.
RoboCop is again played by Peter Weller, who played RoboCop in the first film. However, although a second sequel and a television series were made, this was the last time Weller played the role, due to complaints of how cumbersome and exhausting it was to wear the suit and also because Weller found RoboCop 2 to be a very negative and disappointing film to work on. Weller's co-star, Nancy Allen, had similar negative feelings regarding the second film.
Despite not being directed by Paul Verhoeven, the director of the first film, RoboCop 2 contains many of his hallmarks, such as satirical television commercials (such as for an ultra powerful sunblock to deal with the devastation of Earth's ozone layer which is actually carcinogenic) and ironically upbeat news broadcasts, hallmarks which also appear in Verhoeven's later film Starship Troopers. The events in the second film closely follow the events in the first film (the ED-209 unit, for example, is mentioned as being deployed and malfunctioning).
[edit] Cast
- Peter Weller as Alex Murphy/RoboCop
- Belinda Bauer as Dr. Juliette Faxx
- Felton Perry as Chairman Donald Johnson
- John Glover as Magnavolt Salesman
- Mario Machado as Casey Wong
- Leeza Gibbons as Jess Perkins
- John Ingle as Surgeon General
- Tom Noonan as Cain/RoboCop 2
- Roger Aaron Brown as Whittaker
- Willard E. Pugh as Mayor Marvin Kuzak
- Gabriel Damon as Hob
- Galyn Görg as Angie
- Mark Rolston as Stef
- Lila Finn as Homeless Woman
- John Hateley as Purse Snatcher
- Gage Tarrant as Hooker
- Thomas Rosales Jr. as Chet (as Tommy Rosales)
- Brandon Smith as Flint
- Wallace Merck as Gun Shop Owner
- Stephen Lee as Officer Duffy
- Robert DoQui as Sgt. Reed (as Robert Do'Qui)
- Ken Lerner as Delaney
- Jeff McCarthy as Holzgang
- Nancy Allen as Anne Lewis
- Linda Thompson as Mother with Baby
- Brandon Smith as Chet (as Tommy Rosales)
- Tzi Ma as Tak Akita
- Wanda De Jesus as Estevez
[edit] Critical reaction
This film received mixed reviews from critics and fans of the first film. While the special effects and action sequences are widely praised, a common complaint was that the film did not focus enough on RoboCop and his partner Lewis and that the film's human story of the man trapped inside the machine was ultimately lost within a sea of violence. In his review, Roger Ebert said "Cain's sidekicks include a violent, foul-mouthed young boy (Gabriel Damon), who looks to be about 12 years old but kills people without remorse, swears like Eddie Murphy, and eventually takes over the drug business... The movie's screenplay is a confusion of half-baked and unfinished ideas... the use of that killer child is beneath contempt...".
Additionally, the movie "reset" RoboCop's character by turning him back into the monotone-voiced peacekeeper seen early in the first film (despite the fact that by the end of the first film, he had regained his human identity and speech mannerisms). Many were also critical of the child villain Hob; David Nusair of reelfilm stated, "That the film asks us to swallow a moment late in the story that features Robo taking pity on an injured Hob is heavy-handed and ridiculous (we should probably be thankful the screenwriters didn't have RoboCop say something like, 'Look at what these vile drugs have done to this innocent boy')."
[edit] Critics Review
- Internet Movie Database
(5.3/10) link (Variable).
[edit] See also
- List of American films of 1990
- RoboCop, RoboCop 3, and RoboCop: Prime Directives
- Frank Miller's RoboCop
[edit] References
[edit] External links
- RoboCop 2 at Allmovie
- RoboCop 2 at the Internet Movie Database
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