Sunday, January 13, 2019

Replicas: I Watch Movies So You Don't Have To


So, this will be a first for the blog. I have decided not to spend any energy on reviewing this absolute catastrophe of a film, but instead I'm going to spoil the everloving shit out of it. I don't care. And I know you don't care, either. You either have never heard of Replicas or you weren't fuckwitted enough to want to see it. I didn't even want to see it. And... let's clear this up right now... I did NOT go see this movie. I found it online by accident and watched it at home for a laugh with a sick wife. I pay $20/month to get three free movies at an AMC theater and I'd rather pay the money and see nothing than use this film as one of my three. So, without further adieu... here is what you're missing with Replicas.

So, Keanu is Bill. He's a scientist working for a company called BioSomething. He's been working on an algorithm to transfer the thoughts and memories and every part of a person's brain and consciousness into a robot. He's about to boot up test subject 354 into a robot that looks so utterly ridiculous, even video gamers would complain how shitty the robot looks:
It's like you described the robot from I, Robot to a blind person and had them design what you described on a computer from 1994. Anyway, they bring in a dead soldier - because that's what he's trying to do, save dead soldiers - and they transfer his consciousness to the robot. But, once the dude realizes he's a robot... he freaks out and starts ripping out his own face. Another test failed. Sad Keanu.

Keanu's boss tells him he has one last chance to get it right or he's going to shut Keanu down. Keanu goes home to his family. His hot wife, his son, his older daughter and his youngest daughter. They're about to take a family vacation. Keanu's co-worker Thomas Middleditch (that dude from Silicon Valley) comes over to...uh... watch the family fish while they're away? (I'm not making that up.) So, the family departs, but on the way, there's some bad weather and Keanu hits a tree that impales his wife and sends him off the road. Instead of just hitting the brakes like a normal human would do, Keanu lets the car careen into a river where the rest of his children drown. He has to pull them from the wreckage. In a moment of panic, Keanu gets out his phone. He does not call the police or do anything remotely legal. Since he does science good, he knows there's another option - call his co-worker and the two of them can clone his family.

Co-worker shows up, questions the morality of the situation for like two seconds, then the two of them take the bodies to Keanu's garage. Co-worker brings him pods to grow clones out of. Only... there's three pods. That's it. Only three. But there's four people. But three pods. Keanu wrestles with this internally and decides there's only one possible way he can figure out who to save and who to leave fucking dead - put names into a bowl. He selects hot wife (obvs), older son and older daughter. Young daughter has to go. He also figures that instead of having to explain to hot wife how there was only a limited amount of pods and little daughter had to stay dead, he would just wipe their memories that little daughter even existed in the first place. Don't think too hard about the fact that there are a myriad of people in the world who would know about this girl's existence (doctors, extended family members, the government). As long as his wife and kids forget here - he's in the clear. And so goes growing his family back over a seventeen day period.

In the meantime, Co-worker reminds Keanu that there's other people in the world who will realize that his family is missing for seventeen days. So, Keanu gets out all the tech - computers and cell phones. He tells the principal he's decided to home school his kids. He tells his kids' friends that they can't come out because they're grounded. He discovers his daughter has a bae named Juan and winds up telling Juan she's grounded until she's 18 bc Juan wants to smash. Anyhoo, he brings the family back. They wake up and everything is normal. The end. Except not the end at all. Keanu hasn't really wiped out the memory of youngest daughter as things start to come back to the family - things like there was once a bunkbed in older daughter's room... son remembers there being extra pictures of someone on the wall... hot wife remembers name of daughter. But before they can hash out the fact that Keanu literally wiped the memory of a fucking human daughter person... Keanu's boss shows up and interrupts dinner.

He reveals that he knew what Keanu was doing all along and let it happen because Keanu doesn't actually work at a BioSomething company - it was just a front for - uh... nefarious shit? Boss wants Keanu's algorithm, and for him to say goodbye to his family before he kills them for good. Goons show up to the house to kill them and Keanu and family manage to escape. But, after a very lackluster and boring car chase, the goons get the family. So, Keanu decides to imprint his own brain into the robot. The robot comes to life and talks just like Keanu (don't think too hard about how vocal cords are what make our voices sound like us and not our brains). Robo-Keanu stops the bad guys and regular Keanu makes a deal with his boss. If boss lets them escape, he'll let Robo-Keanu stay with him and make him tons of money doing... nefarious science shit? Boss agrees. Regular Keanu and family escape to the beach and he winds up bringing back youngest daughter because he apparently found another pod to grow her in, but didn't have this pod last time, but now has the pod this time because reasons. The last shot of the movie is boss leading a sick, old, rich dude in Dubai into a room to promise him a new opportunity at life. He reveals his business partner - Robo-Keanu... who, no joke... wears a fucking three piece suit.

Replicas is a dumb as balls movie from dumb as balls people. John Wick has really been a godsend to both us as audience members and Keanu in revitalizing his career. But, he really has to stop making movies like Replicas if he doesn't want to fade back into obscurity once the John Wick movies are really done (I hope they never are). I love me some Keanu, but damn if this movie isn't three shits to the wind stupid. Don't bother with it. But I don't have to tell you that - you weren't going to see it anyway.

D-

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