What a waste of a premise, and what a waste of Woodley’s talents. Based on the short story “The Robot Who Looked Like Me” by Robert Sheckley, Robots has some clever things to say about the state of advanced tech and its role in society, but its clumsy, heavyhanded approach fumbles the execution. There’s an awkward and unfinished feel to Robots that doesn’t make anything about it believable—not the technology, not the convoluted story, and certainly not the romance. And except for Woodley, none of the characters seem likable. The male-dominated cast makes constant jokes about fatness and femininity, presumably for the sake of satire, but they end up participating in the very things they’re supposedly calling out. It’s not nearly as smart nor as charming as it thinks it is, and if you’re looking for an alternative, I would recommend the far superior German film I’m Your Man, which accomplishes everything Robots tries to be and more.
Synopsis
A womanizer and a gold digger trick people into relationships with illegal robot doubles. When they unwittingly use this scam on each other, their robot doubles fall in love and elope, forcing the duo to team up to hunt them down before the authorities discover their secret.
Storyline
In the near future, Charles (Jack Whitehall) and Elaine (Shailene Woodley) secretly use their robot clones to commit some misdeeds, but their life of duplicity comes to a halt when the robots decide to run off together.
TLDR
Seriously, Shailene Woodley is too good of an actress for this.
What stands out
I’m not sure what’s more nauseating, the fact that the female robots are used almost purely for sex, or that this isn’t flagged as anything other than mildly annoying in the film. There is a glaring theme here about women’s bodies being treated as sexual objects, but the filmmakers don’t seem intelligent enough to pick up on it. Instead, it’s just there lying flat and wasted like the movie’s potential and prospects.