Starring: Bruce Willis, Radha Mitchell
Director: Jonathan Mostow (U-571, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines)
Running Time: 1 hr 28 min
Release Date: Sept. 25, 2009
Budget: $80 million
Average Critics’ Score: 42%
“…smart speculative suspenser…” Todd McCarthy, Variety
“…is all windup and no pitch.” David Hiltbrand, Philadelphia Inquirer
Like the humans hiding behind the titular machines, Surrogates has an interesting, relevant premise and a suspenseful ending buried beneath the boring storytelling and drawn-out action sequences. The homely characters in this mediocre sci-fi thriller take Nintendo Wii’s concept up a notch by living their lives via beautiful robots. Their world is as perfect as the surrogates look until a conspiracy to kill them off slowly unfolds. Willis and Mitchell, as FBI agents, perfectly capture their surrogates’ robotic nuances, but their acting is consequentially too stiff. Willis’ few emotional scenes and the moral question of how much humans should use technology to alter the world are Surrogates’ best but most underdeveloped parts.
