Real Steel Review: Story Over Spectacle

If you had asked me last week what to expect from Real Steel, I would’ve laughed off the thought of seeing it. I was less than thrilled heading into the screening and really hoping, if nothing else, I wouldn’t have to fight the urge to leave the theater. With months of promotion for what looked like a feature adaptation of Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em robots starring Hugh Jackman, a man whose career choices I’ve always thought were based on spectacle rather than story, I was entirely unprepared for what I got.

In the not-too-distant future, mankind’s appetite for violence and mayhem in exhibition has reached such a point that boxing and mixed martial arts fighting is no longer brutal enough for mass audiences. Instead, huge robots controlled by remote rip each other apart in sanctioned ways no humans could…well, except maybe in imperial Rome. Charlie Kenton (Jackman), a former boxer, makes his living traveling the amateur circuit. After losing his last working robot, and reneging on a few bad bets, he’s pulled back home to sign over custody of his son Max (Dakota Goyo) to his ex sister-in-law. After a silly and contrived plot point involving his new guardians needing to go away for the summer, Charlie agrees to look after Max in exchange for a huge pay day.

The two embark on an adventure that eventually takes them all around the country. On one scavenging mission for parts, Max discovers an old sparring robot, built to take a lot of hits but not really fight back. He names his new toy Atom, and is insistent his father get him a fight. After a few small wins, a little dancing, and some training modifications, Atom gains some underground notoriety that leads him to the mainstream while Charlie and Max have a chance to build the relationship they’ve never had.

Now, Real Steel is far from a perfect movie. But, it’s honestly pretty good if you get past some of the sillier contrived notions of the script, which stray far from the considerably less showy Richard Matheson story it’s based on. Summer blockbusters like Transformers that are ultimately aimed at a more toyetic audience could take some notes from director Shawn Levy (Night at the Museum) and co., who understand that an emotional undercurrent is really all you need to hold interest.

For his part, Jackman solidly carries the brunt of the film. He comes across a little melodramatic in the early part of the story, but finds his character at about the same time Charlie finds Max. After the debacles of Australia and Wolverine, maybe now he’s ready to tackle some better roles. I’m always impressed by a child actor who can do more than act as piece of scenery, but Goyo manages the emotional arc of his character with surprising depth and ease, so much so that I actually found myself a little choked up in the closing scenes.

The supporting cast is used rather sparingly, which for the intended villains of the piece, keeps you from realizing how one dimensional they are. But again, it works. The story’s not about them. Evangeline Lilly as Jackman’s love interest is given the surface of a subplot and is deserving of a little more. She’s got the dramatic gravitas to break through in features, and hopefully this project will be a stepping stone to something much more substantial for her.

One gripe I do have is the ending, which left me feeling a little bit wanting for more, but not enough to hope for a follow up. I’m not saying it’s a clear ploy for a sequel, but I was looking forward to a real climax considering this is a sport all about making sure your opponent can’t get back up again.

Real Steel‘s not going to make fans out of everyone. Still, I feel like there’s an audience out there that’s going to love this movie a lot more than I did. It reminds me of movies from my youth like The Rocketeer which, while not an award-winning example of cinema, is great fun to revisit with a sense of nostalgia. Similarly, I think a lot of younger kids seeing Real Steel in theaters will be breaking out the blu-ray in their twenties to relive again.

Images courtesy of DreamWorks