http://www.themoviebox.net/movies/2004/IJKLM/I-Robot/trailer-page.html
Funny, I don’t remember any high-speed motorcycle chases or robot conspiracies in the book.
What little hope I had for this movie just disappeared. Not only did they turn it into an action movie, they appear to have turned it into a bad action movie.
Gee, wasn’t there a book by Isaac Asimov by that name? The title made me think this had something to do with that.
No offence, but what did you expect? The term Sci-Fi conjours up, in Hollywood anyways, images of high tech gadgets (that can be sold as merchandise) and action with things blowing up and what not.
The way that Hollywood sees scifi doesn’t include average mystery stories and few gadgets. Lets face it, Asimov wrote a lot of cheesy who-dun-its that were set in either the future or outer space. Other than that, they are just cheesy mysteries.
Oh, and there is precedent for this sort of thing, ie: Blade Runner and Dune (the Lynch movie).
Eh? Lots of Asimov’s stories aren’t mysteries at all… 
The only stories by him I considered “space mysteries” were the Lije Bailey stories, although I haven’t read all of Asimov’s SF novels so maybe some of his other stories were mysteries too.
Isaac Asimov, the guy who wrote the Foundation series? Cheesy mysteries? Huh?!
And Hollywood did produce Gattaca, an excellent, thoughtful sci-fi film with very little action. A diamond in the rough perhaps, but I was hoping I, Robot would be another such diamond, given its Asimovian roots. Well, foolish me. 
How were they supposed to do this anyway? I, Robot is a short story anthology, not a novel.
I suppose they could have made three or four short films, with something connecting them together. I seem to remember there was some talk of making I, Robot into a movie in the past, and I think that’s what they were planning.
It was a Harlan Ellison project from the 70’s. Here’s a link to Amazon, where you can buy the original screenplay.
I’ve never read Asimov, and to be honest, I’ve never cared for 99% of science fiction writing. But I’m interested in this movie because it was directed by Alex Proyas, who made the first Crow film and the excellent Dark City, and he has an amazing visual style.
And that’s probably all we’re going to get: style. Whoever’s marketing this movie is counting on name recognition; all sizzle, no steak.
The worst part is that they apparently changed the point of the stories from “Robots are tools with safeties built in but may occasionally malfunction” to “Robots are dangerously evil and are trying to take over the world.” Way to spit on Asimov’s legacy.
And at least Bicentennial Man kept the 3 laws intact. “They can’t hurt us” indeed!
Wow, that trailer looks like ass.
And it bombed at the box office, thus reinforcing Hollywood’s understanding of SF as a vehicle for effects and 'splosions.
I haven’t read the story on which this is based but after seeing the trailer, this movie is a LONG way down the list of movies I’m looking forward to…but it is on the list.
There were a few lines of dialogue in the trailer which is total Will Smith action movie dialogue which I wasn’t crazy about, I’m already pretty clear on the plot (w/o having read the book mind you), the robot committing crimes thing is kinda neat but kidna Matrixy. This movie is released on July 16 on a week which nothing else is released so I’ll probably watch.
Well, Gattica tried to be thoughtful, but failed miserably. It paradox is that it only seems thoughtful if you don’t think about it. The producers expected the viewers to turn their minds off, just as if it were a mindless action movie.
I have gotten some background: This was originally a screenplay called “Hardwired,” that had nothing to do with Asimov. They didn’t want to (or couldn’t) use that name, so they thought that “I, Robot” was a good name (it’s been used even before Asimov by Eando Binder as a title that became a Twilight Zone episode). So they bought up the rights to the Asimov book, changed the character names, and added the three laws.
Actually, I’d be interested in seeing it. Alex Proyas did Dark City, so it might be a good film – though it has no relation to the Asimov (or the Binder).
Ugh… They “Paycheck’ed” this movie… turning a thoughtful sci-fi story into a mindless action flick. And they wonder why these sci-fi fans that buy all these books don’t go see the movies of those books.
Do they wonder that? WHO wonders that? I would think that the standard moviegoers that line up to see a movie like Paycheck or I, Robot (regardless of quality) vastly outnumber the people who read the original stories the movies were loosely based on.
I don’t think Hollywood producers are bemoaning a few Asimov fans skipping their huge Will Smith summer sci-fi blockbuster any more than the bigwigs behind Lord of the Rings were worried about a few Tolkien loyalists who groused that the movies wouldn’t do justice to the books they loved.
In movie terms, there is a huge difference between science fiction and “sci-fi”. Science fiction movies engage the brain: think The Truman Show or Being John Malkovich. Sci-fi is just explosions with robots or spaceships thrown in.
Here’s the kicker. Any movie that markets itself as science fiction is really sci-fi. Movies that are science fiction market themselves as anything but those words because sci-fi movies have poisoned the term.
And if GC designers don’t learn real soon that “one is good, a million is even better” is a way to damnation, they’re going to put themselves out of business.
My only hope is that when they get around to making Iain M. Banks’ Consider Phlebas into a movie (it, of all his books, would translate best, I think), they better get Peter Jackson, 'cuz that’s a movie that needs incredible action AND amazing story, performances, cinematography, etc.
Hey, now, wait a minute. There’s nothing necessarily wrong with that.
I thought it might have made a decent movie if it wasn’t based on Asimov’s works. By the looks of it they’ve sidelined Dr Calvin to a sidekick role, made the robots homicidial manics with emotions, and turned US Robotics from a largely responsible IT company into an Illuminandi subsididary.
There were changes in LOTR, mostly for ‘pacing reasons’, but at least they kept faithful to the basic prinicples. This movie is gonna suck arse, but at least it looks pretty.