"Robot Revolution" ranks as an abominable sci-fi thriller that has an interesting premise but suffers from pedestrian production values and amateur acting. In the near future, a blond Mobile Infantry Police woman, Constable Hawkins (Virginia Logan), with her anonymous android partner prowl a New Jersey apartment block to arrest notorious terrorist Damien Roth. They fail to find Roth. Instead, they locate a diminutive, bespectacled nerd of a woman who has concocted a lethal weapon that features nanobots. Vaguely, "Prometheus Trap" director Andew Bellware and "Boom Boom Dolls" scenarist Steve J. Niles draw on Michael Crichton's bestseller "Prey" and the big screen flop "Dredd." These two frequent sci-fi collaborators must be rabid fans of John Carpenter because "Robot Revolution" contains most of the earmarks of an early Carpenter classic. This 84-minute sci-fi film takes place in a contemporary society with next to no futuristic equipment. The most impressive example is a monstrous robot cleaner that resembles a gigantic insect, not a very practical robot but an atmospheric addition. Our plucky heroine recalls Snake Plissken with her black eye patch and outfit. Did I mention she totes a mighty big pistol? Bellware confines the action to one apartment building with endless roving exterior shots of the edifice. The nanobots infiltrate all the machinery, and eventually infect most of the humans in the apartment block. The infected humans behave like zombies; they bleed from the mouth and the nostrils, but they don't bleed enough to be remotely disgusting. One of the most irritating things about "Robot Revolution" is the horrible cinematography. Even when no machines are present, such as when we are shown the building exteriors, everything appears botched, with horizontal lines streaking the picture, as if there was something affecting the equipment. This lackluster movie boasts minimal surprises, and its bare-bones budget and lack of invention hampers it. Nothing about any of the characters make them sympathetic or antagonistic. In other words, you don't have reason to root for the heroine or hate the villains. The widescreen compositions aren't bad, but the characters are nothing memorable, especially the robot. As usual, there a lot of exposition, but most of it is incoherent. Only die-hard sci-fi fans may salvage something from this nonsense. If you're looking for a gory, shoot'em up saga with lots of profanity and nudity, you will definitely be disappointed by this one.
4 Reviews
extremely disappointing
the_doofy6 March 2019
I ran across Prometheus Trap and watched it. P Trap is one of the better science fiction movies I've ever seen, despite the crappy rating it has in IMDB. I noticed the one professional movie critic that did a review on it had the same take as me. (I ended up buying P trap off amazon.)
--Robot Revolution has been put together by the same group, but with a budget, I managed to find it and went in with very high expectations. What a let down.
--Poor lighting, poor sound (bongo drum music sometimes makes it so U can't actually hear some of the dialogue), the robot swaggers, very poor camera work, acting is below average for most characters, script is not very original, too much pot smoking, I could go on
--basically its 'god what happened to U people'? Is Prometheus trap a one hit wonder, or did U people have a bunch of subs doing your jobs in this movie? Did the hand of the movie god touch your souls for one amazing inspirational movie and then moved on to greener pastures, leaving U in a perpetual creative drought?------------- COME ON
--Robot Revolution has been put together by the same group, but with a budget, I managed to find it and went in with very high expectations. What a let down.
--Poor lighting, poor sound (bongo drum music sometimes makes it so U can't actually hear some of the dialogue), the robot swaggers, very poor camera work, acting is below average for most characters, script is not very original, too much pot smoking, I could go on
--basically its 'god what happened to U people'? Is Prometheus trap a one hit wonder, or did U people have a bunch of subs doing your jobs in this movie? Did the hand of the movie god touch your souls for one amazing inspirational movie and then moved on to greener pastures, leaving U in a perpetual creative drought?------------- COME ON
Was there ever a storyline? Perhaps between random lens flare, static, and a floor waxer.
pmiddlet16 July 2015
Warning: Spoilers
This movie attempts to wow viewers with a few video game'ish graphics amidst an extraordinarily confused plot - which isn't quite sure if it wants to follow an AI-takeover-the-world or bad guys start "Resident Upheaval" trajectory. Frankly, it does neither. In fact, I'm quite sure I missed its intent entirely. Guess I needed a DVD cover...
As another reviewer mentions, this very meshuggi plot surrounds a somewhat dystopian near-future where martial law (for what its pathetically worth) has been enacted to prevent some sort of semi- organized terrorism. To what end? Apparently to 'hack' the humans (of course), each of whom are all, in Draconian fashion, forced to have implanted ID chips by age 16. A real teenage buzzkill to be sure.
Enter the platinum-blonde eyepatch wearing Constable and her trusty- rusty swagger-droid, Argos, to investigate a tenant building for terrorists. Their escapades include endless traipsing among the very randomly placed drug-vaping tenant population, and one ominous looking robot floor waxer (probably a relic from a DARPA project with Amway?).
Eyepatch and Argos locate the apartment of a nervous-hilaria and discover a (token) magic shiny silver canister - which is of course some sort of weapon. It contains a gaseous cloud of 'nanobots' which, when accidentally released during a lackluster skirmish, seems to interact with folks ID implants, turning them into zombies (although the characters assure us "they are not zombies"...meh).
Now, Eyepatch and Swagger-Bot are forced to fight their way out, with the human-zombie-bots, with the floor cleaner, and maybe a Cuisinart or 2....(one could have wished).
Intermittent with the storyline are random projections of TV snow-like computer static. This has no rhyme or reason. Equally as annoying is the constant looping of the background score which pervades the entire flick. This felt like lazy music production (though the score had its potential, in a Carpenterian sort of way), as did the sound mic'ing and mastering.
Don't get me wrong. I'm a huge advocate for low budget sci-fi. There have been *fantastic* and well-thought efforts in this genre. But this one gets lost in oddly placed graphics, which, like any CGI annoyance that doesn't have any function - simply has no believability. Sci-fi crowds are notorious for picking these things out - don't insult them with useless animations.
Now, I get that sometimes chaos is just, well, fun. We've seen this in its best and worst (note the different episodes of the Mad Max yarn). But when it lacks some even semi-recognizable purpose, one can't be expected to connect to the plot, setting, or characters. This is where Robot Revolution unfortunately meanders into the mist...or a confused cloud of nanobots.
As another reviewer mentions, this very meshuggi plot surrounds a somewhat dystopian near-future where martial law (for what its pathetically worth) has been enacted to prevent some sort of semi- organized terrorism. To what end? Apparently to 'hack' the humans (of course), each of whom are all, in Draconian fashion, forced to have implanted ID chips by age 16. A real teenage buzzkill to be sure.
Enter the platinum-blonde eyepatch wearing Constable and her trusty- rusty swagger-droid, Argos, to investigate a tenant building for terrorists. Their escapades include endless traipsing among the very randomly placed drug-vaping tenant population, and one ominous looking robot floor waxer (probably a relic from a DARPA project with Amway?).
Eyepatch and Argos locate the apartment of a nervous-hilaria and discover a (token) magic shiny silver canister - which is of course some sort of weapon. It contains a gaseous cloud of 'nanobots' which, when accidentally released during a lackluster skirmish, seems to interact with folks ID implants, turning them into zombies (although the characters assure us "they are not zombies"...meh).
Now, Eyepatch and Swagger-Bot are forced to fight their way out, with the human-zombie-bots, with the floor cleaner, and maybe a Cuisinart or 2....(one could have wished).
Intermittent with the storyline are random projections of TV snow-like computer static. This has no rhyme or reason. Equally as annoying is the constant looping of the background score which pervades the entire flick. This felt like lazy music production (though the score had its potential, in a Carpenterian sort of way), as did the sound mic'ing and mastering.
Don't get me wrong. I'm a huge advocate for low budget sci-fi. There have been *fantastic* and well-thought efforts in this genre. But this one gets lost in oddly placed graphics, which, like any CGI annoyance that doesn't have any function - simply has no believability. Sci-fi crowds are notorious for picking these things out - don't insult them with useless animations.
Now, I get that sometimes chaos is just, well, fun. We've seen this in its best and worst (note the different episodes of the Mad Max yarn). But when it lacks some even semi-recognizable purpose, one can't be expected to connect to the plot, setting, or characters. This is where Robot Revolution unfortunately meanders into the mist...or a confused cloud of nanobots.
PEOPLE CAN BE HACKED
nogodnomasters30 May 2019
Warning: Spoilers
The film drops you into the future in a controlled society due to outbreaks of war and terrorism using nanobots. In this case it is best to read the DVD cover prior to watching the film so as to understand some of the background. People have an ID chip implanted in their heads at age 16 making it easy for one-eyed Constable Hawkings (Virginia Logan) to identify them with a small scanner. Hawkings works with a robot/android named Argos or Argis. About half of the film is what our robot sees, giving it a modified hand held camera feel, one that has numbers and tiny print off to the corner so we know it's him.
Our law enforcers enter a high rise apartment building constructed of white painted cinder blocks and sparse furnishings. The movie takes place inside this New Jersey building.
The script used the modern terrorist aspect to mimic their terrorist group as being peaceful Osirans (and Horus) but in reality are making nanobombs in an uncontrolled environment/workshop. There didn't seem to be a message or theme to the madness, possibly because the story was poorly developed.
Hawkings looks interesting for a "Mobile Infantry Police" sporting standard issue clothes that reveal her midriff, but don't expect anything more. Her character was less developed than her uniform. We do get to meet some mildly interesting characters on the way into the building, but they never took advantage of them, rather turning them into "flesh puppets" i.e. zombie types.
The film wasn't half bad up onto the point they had 7 people in a room basically doing nothing for a far too long period of time. After this the film lost me as far as entertainment value and continued on a downward slide.
This is a somewhat low budget film, that used some decent effects, including a cleaner robot that didn't seem to be CG. The shooting was framed well, the sound was good, I never saw a microphone.
For those who like low budget android movies filmed in Jersey City, NJ there is also "Battledroid"in case you thought this was the worse android film from New Jersey.
Guide: Infrequent F-bomb. Two women kissing. Opening logo has B&W nude film of an oriental woman
Our law enforcers enter a high rise apartment building constructed of white painted cinder blocks and sparse furnishings. The movie takes place inside this New Jersey building.
The script used the modern terrorist aspect to mimic their terrorist group as being peaceful Osirans (and Horus) but in reality are making nanobombs in an uncontrolled environment/workshop. There didn't seem to be a message or theme to the madness, possibly because the story was poorly developed.
Hawkings looks interesting for a "Mobile Infantry Police" sporting standard issue clothes that reveal her midriff, but don't expect anything more. Her character was less developed than her uniform. We do get to meet some mildly interesting characters on the way into the building, but they never took advantage of them, rather turning them into "flesh puppets" i.e. zombie types.
The film wasn't half bad up onto the point they had 7 people in a room basically doing nothing for a far too long period of time. After this the film lost me as far as entertainment value and continued on a downward slide.
This is a somewhat low budget film, that used some decent effects, including a cleaner robot that didn't seem to be CG. The shooting was framed well, the sound was good, I never saw a microphone.
For those who like low budget android movies filmed in Jersey City, NJ there is also "Battledroid"in case you thought this was the worse android film from New Jersey.
Guide: Infrequent F-bomb. Two women kissing. Opening logo has B&W nude film of an oriental woman
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