Surrogates

Time Out New York Keith Uhlich

What follows is pulp made near-profound through director Jonathan Mostow’s sure-handed guidance.

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

There's fun robot stuff, some good philosophical ideas, and a brief, nutty Willis-Ving Rhames reunion 15 years after "Pulp Fiction."

New York Post Kyle Smith

Among cheesy sci-fi movies meant to make you think, I'll take Surrogates over "District 9." Both are highly derivative, but in the course of recombining the basic chromosomes of "Blade Runner," "The Matrix" and especially "I, Robot," Surrogates nudges the robo-thriller in an interesting direction.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

This represesents the smartest high-budget, high-profile science fiction film to have come along in quite some time.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

Surrogates stays afloat by not taking itself too seriously, but also by recognizing that a movie about robots shouldn't look as if it were made by one.

Variety Todd McCarthy

Mostow's smart speculative suspenser imagines a time when people can live through ideal versions of themselves while they sit wired up at home.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

Surrogates is entertaining and ingenious, but it settles too soon for formula.

Village Voice Nick Pinkerton

Willis is fine, both as his blond action figure (Zack Morris hair) and actual self, in trusty bruised palooka mode. Mostow does good meat-and-potatoes genre work, coherent even when reckless.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey

The questions the movie raises have less to do with science than movie execution: Do the actors sound so robotic because they are playing robots well or humans badly? And did a machine write this dialogue? If so, could we please apply for an upgrade?

USA Today Claudia Puig

Half a howler but not nearly funny enough.

Boston Globe Ty Burr

A reasonably watchable sci-fi B movie, a case of a good director and some intriguing ideas struggling to overcome formula plotting, limp dialogue, and a serious case of the sillies.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps

Relentlessly plods from one dour moment to the next, coming to life only in a late-film car chase that takes the possibilities of a world filled with robots to an absurd extreme.

The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt

A mechanical sci-fi'er absent of logic or emotions. It functions as an expensive place-filler on the Disney release schedule and, as such, will be welcomed by only the least discriminating thriller fans.

The New York Times Manohla Dargis

In this kind of industrial entertainment, particularly one that seems to be missing some connective narrative tissue, it’s hard to know if the writers or the director can be credited or blamed for what’s left on screen.

Los Angeles Times Robert Abele

An interesting idea, but unfortunately, the film's narrative and emotional engine operate as mechanically as the titular, dead-eyed glamazoids.

Time Richard Corliss

An ambitious but sub-ordinary SF epic in which, as so often, Willis is better than his material.

Philadelphia Inquirer David Hiltbrand

Surrogates, which borrows tone and content freely from "I, Robot," is all windup and no pitch.

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

The premise for this sci-fi actioner makes sense for about four seconds, after which you begin to wonder why everyone on the planet would willingly become a shut-in.

Washington Post Dan Kois

Surrogates takes an interesting idea -- the triumph of technological convenience over grimy, workaday life -- and buries it under clumsy exposition, unconvincing action sequences and a by-the-numbers conspiracy plot.

New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman

The filmmakers were too busy throwing together potential blockbuster material to notice all the loose ends and gaping holes in logic. Which may, ultimately, explain why Willis looks so confused throughout. Maybe he, too, is straining to locate some intelligence amid all the machinery.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

Surrogates' morality is less Asimov than asinine, although it's bizarrely reassuring, in a nihilistic sort of way, to believe that in the future, when the world is ready to play The Sims for real (so to speak), our avatars are all going to look like generic porn stars with shitty airbrush jobs.