RoboCop

What a wonderfully bonkers movie.

Do you think studio executives knew that Paul Verhoeven was going to use their big and bawdy action films as backdrops for satirical commentary? I know they had to understand what they were getting–it’s Verhoeven after all–but I like to think they didn’t grasp what was happening, and then he snuck in with these nutty and over-the-top films like “RoboCop,” “Total Recall, and “Starship Troopers.”

I hadn’t seen this movie in at least 30 years, so I only had two vague memories of it:

1. “I’ll buy that for a dollar!” (What does this mean? Why is it so catchy? And why did the Dollar Store not latch on to it?)
2. One of the bad guys gets deformed by toxic waste (you know it’s toxic waste because he drives into a giant vat labeled “Toxic Waste”) and then, moments later, that same guy explodes into a cloud of goo when he’s hit by a car.

This time around I appreciated the fake news reports and commercials (“Nukem” and the “6000 SUX - with 8.2 MPG!" are both brilliant).

It was also hilarious to see Eric Forman’s dad as the villain. How many bad guys look like a lankier George Costanza?

Incidentally, Kurtwood Smith – the “RoboCop” bad guy / Eric Forman’s dad – has one of the longest IMDb entries I’ve ever seen. This guy works all the time.

One last thing: Peter Weller’s signature move as RoboCop was to turn his head in the direction his body would soon go. Need to go left? Spin the head 90-degrees, then shift the rest of the robo body. He kept this up throughout the whole movie.