In the future, everyone will have a surrogate, who will do everything for you. It's basically like, you build a robot, you control it, it does all the stuff for you, and if it blows up, hey! You just go and get another one. Kind of like what the American politicians are doing with the soliders over in Iraq and Afghanistan. This is Surrogates, a movie I missed in the theatre, but watched recently all in the confines of my home...without the stick floor, and the people whispering behind me (I hired two people to simulate the experience by whispering behind me, but fired them, when they weren't doing their job properly...I could still hear the movie).
Anyhow, this movie is all concept. The world is without war, or crime, because no one feels anymore (though people still find a unique way of getting high through their surrogates...even when we have developed a technology that revolutionizes modern society, people still use it for absolutely useless and destructive behaviour), there is no more human contact, and everyone looks way better than their real self. When someone kills a surrogate, there is an investigation, that leads our good guy Willis, to this zone where people refuse to get surrogates because it is artificial life, and thus not the real experience of life. Heavy. Things get even more kooky, when Willis' surrogate is destroyed, and his real self (who looks like Hell) tries to investigate, and realizes that society is now a shell of its former self, because it's all fake now.
Interesting idea, and something I could see actually happening, considering the sad state that society is in, now. I mean, the idea of a surrogate is enticing, as the person you present to the world is often idealized, stays that way forever, you can do extraordinary physical feats, and nothing can really harm you, because if your destroyed, you just get a new one and send it out there. In fact, people are stunned when they see real people. However, they also lose the capacity to feel, as whatever happens to your surrogate never happens to you (except the aforementioned "getting high", and oh yeah, there's also this weapon that can take out you and your surrogate...all for one low, low price), and you can see people begin to degenerate, as their physical selves are neglected in favour of their artificial dopplegangers.
If I have a criticism of it as a movie, and I do have one, it's that on the level of a murder mystery, it fails as it is hugely apparent who is behind the deaths of the surrogates and their operators fairly early. In the case of some thrillers like that, it's the journey that matters, not the mystery, but that is not the case in this one; you are supposed to not know who is behind it, even though the motives of the brains behind it is painfully obvious, and all the other developments in the film are easily predicted, as well. It seems that despite the concept of the film being interesting and provoking discussion, the filmmakers or the studio, or your Aunt Sally, or whomever was calling the shots, was content to have the plot unfold as another formulaic whodunit, with a ridiculously obvious antagonist.
Anyhow, I did enjoy this film, for the concept, and for Bruce Willis, who despite not winning any movie awards, always seems to turn in a solid performance.
Rating: 3.5 stars
I bid thee a fond goodnight...you and your surrogate.
- Stephenstein
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