Review: 'Real Steel' tries too hard to be likeable

Film: Real Steel (U/A)
Director: Shawn Levy
Cast: Hugh Jackman, Dakota Goyo, Max Kenton, Evangeline Lilly, Anthony Mackie
Rating: **

Real Steel is the story of former boxer Charlie Kenton (Jackman) who roams the length and breadth of the US countryside, promoting his breed of fighting robots (It’s 2020 after all!). Short on cash and perpetually in scrapes resulting from his bottomless pit of debts, fate reunites Charlie with 11-year-old Max, the son he never really knew. Not stopping short of granting his son’s custody to his deceased wife’s brother-in-law in return for money, the unscrupulous Charlie must put up with his obstinate son until his wife’s folks return from a trip to Europe. Over time, Charlie’s brusqueness subsides and the two bond over all things robotic and one robot in particular: Atom, who saved young Max’s life as he plummeted of a cliff at the edge of a junk yard one night. 

The adorable (though initially a bit messy, on account of being buried away under a scrap heap) bot, being relatively out-dated, is souped up with the best bits of Charlie’s previous failures.

Atom, who just might be sentient, possesses a salient feature -- shadow mode – that allows him to mimic human motion. This proves to be a boon, with him beating of the completion at underground mecha fight clubs. Soon, Max thinks that his buddy is ready for the robot fighting mega-event, Real Steel World Championship, where he must go toe to toe with the hulking, undefeated Zeus, who’s pretty much universally hailed as the pinnacle of robotic perfection.

Given the circumstances, does our underbot have what it takes to win?

Real Steel, unfortunately, is one big cliché cloaked in predictability. The transformation of the money-minded, stone-hearted father was much too sudden, with his change of heart seeing little foreshadowing towards the middle part of the film. Also, the screenplay’s efforts to make the kid street smart (but a little snot-nosed) endearing were too transparent.

Besides, the whole tempestuous father-son relationship theme was left untempered by the filmmakers. And the idea of machines putting up their dukes in the ring is about as exciting as viewing someone play a video game instead of being behind the controls yourself. This makes identifying with the people maneouvering them difficult.

The story is a major disappointment; Real Steel isn’t all that bad. With its near-future setting, the rustic old-time America look is a welcomed sight over teeming Blade Runneresque metropolises. With its use of technology ranging from animatronics to motion capture, the effects work behind the film is totally convincing (More so, unfortunately, than Jackman’s accent at times) While Real Steel is better than Transformers (the difference here being the film in question definitely has a story), it is still too far predictable and unoriginal.