
2009
89 minutes
Rated PG-13
by Scott Mendelson
Surrogates is pretty good and occasionally great. It's a lean, thoughtful B-movie and is another solid triple for Jonathon Mostow (Breakdown, U-571, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines). I don't know why Disney has treated it like a near-dump, but it's absolutely worth seeing. It has similarities with I, Robot (free tip - keep James Cromwell away from futuristic technology), but like that picture it's at heart an old-fashioned film noir detective film. It sets up a real world where humanity lives their lives through robot doubles and takes real care to detail how such a society would function. It is NOT an action thriller. The one big chase set piece, at around the one-third mark, is the weakest scene in the film as it feels arbitrarily tossed in. The finale feels a little rushed, which may be explained by the mere 89-minute running time, but the movie works. It's well-written, well-acted, and genuinely compelling on an emotional and philosophical level. It is a solid piece of genre film-making, the kind of thing we used to take for granted.
Grade: B
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