Written by: David Lindsay-Abaire, Lowell Ganz, Babaloo Mandel
Starring: Ewan McGregor, Halle Berry, Greg Kinnear, Mel Brooks, Amanda Bynes
Rating: [3.5/5]
As much as young entrepreneurs within a capitalist society are encouraged to find a need in the marketplace and provide a service that helps fill it with the promise of monetary rewards, it does not help to craft something that works too well. After all, with the obsession of continual growth and perpetually selling to a consumer base, it behooves companies to create demand with their products but create them faulty enough where those customers will come back and buy the next edition. Robots explores how this impacts not just consumer devices but the characters themselves, where their existence no longer creates a profit for those trying to obtain it.
Growing up watching the works of Bigweld (Mel Brooks), Rodney Copperbottom (Ewan McGregor) hopes to leave his sleepy town and move to Robot City where he could invent something that will make a difference. As he makes his way into the city, he learns the company of the legendary Bigweld is now run by a board looking to get rid of robots who cannot afford new upgrades, as they make repair parts much more scarce.
Planned obsolescence, or the practice of creating and selling products with the plan to make them obsolete to encourage repeat purchases pretty much summarizes the story operating in Robots. Take an iPhone where with each new update Apple adds in small ways to make the older models of their cellular devices unusable, therefore forcing the customer to buy the new and more expensive phone. Taking it to a tech person to get it fixed will no longer get the job done as the parts to apply the repairs become more scarce. We see this with something as trivial as our mobile devices but seeing it play out with these robots displays the harm in this practice where these robots no longer serve as a customer to this organization. They no longer hold value because they fail to boost the bottom line therefore they deserve to get scrapped.
Looking at this film through this prism makes it feel like quite the dark story but by all means this feature operates as a fun animated film that has a whole host of quips and fart jokes. Having this balance between what we get on the surface and the thematic underpinning of what transpires at Robot City ensures the filmmakers knew what they were doing here. We have the moments where the evil plot gets laid out by these board members and then we have the running joke of the Aunt Fanny (Jennifer Coolidge), who like her name implies, has an incredibly large behind that knocks everyone out when she turns. Incredibly juvenile jokes mixed in tastefully to pair properly with everything happening allowing for this serious topic to have the levity one would want in this type of animated film.
Our central character, Rodney, has this hope and sees the cynicism of the business world as he learns of what has happened with Bigweld’s company upon his arrival. Becoming a man of the people in fixing others helps him build good friendships with the other characters but the relationship he has with his father ultimately pulls the strings for him. It allows for the real emotional core of this film to shine as Rodney does all he does not only for himself but to harness something that both he and his father adore. This dynamic plays out throughout the feature, and the conclusion we get provides the proverbial chef’s kiss.
All in all, Robots displays both the best and worst of capitalism in the promise of rewarding entrepreneurs who seek to fill a need in the marketplace but the reality that profits matter more than a satisfied customer base. Creating a product that can last forever with fixable parts readily available does not help companies continually grow. Just ask the company that makes Instant Pots what happens when you create a great product that does not offer repeat business. Mixing this all together with a touching father-son story of Rodney and his father along with some fun side characters allows for this film to work. It brings the entertainment one would want from a four-quadrant animated film while also delving into some heady topics. A film that has certainly aged well and has grown in my appreciation of it.
Films with Josh 
