Surrogates

 Fourteen years in the future, Second Life gets taken to a whole new level, and Bruce Willis rocks a toupee. Surrogates, yet another artificial intelligence action thriller, might sound intriguing, but the finished product is as superficial and superfluous as its robotic characters. 

In this new world full of mannequin versions of people that would make the creators of the Dove Real Beauty campaign cringe, there is no crime, lots of sex-raves, indestructible bodies and high-flying acrobatics. Strangely enough, there still is a need for a vibrantly active police force that includes Tom Greer (Bruce Willis), a morally sound cop heartbroken by the loss of his son and disenchanted by his now superficial wife Maggie (Rosamund Pike), who rarely leaves her surrogate. This peaceful, Derek-Zoolander-dream-world is shattered when two humans are killed while plugged into their better Beckham selves. Greer takes on the case, which involves the original creator of the surrogates Canter (James Cromwell) and a band of surrogate-protestors called Dreads, led by The Prophet (Ving Rhames). 

The never-ending action scenes are mildly stimulating, the humorous moments few and far between and the dialogue manufactured with metal clunkers like, “Relax, we’re the good guys,” and “It’s life, only better.” Director Jonathan Mostow employs strange, diagonally angled shots that try to give a visual spin on the semi-futuristic set pieces, but his movements add neither depth nor style to the subject matter. Furthermore, the film spoonfeeds the audience bland themes of humanity and A.I. And, when it abruptly ends after its climax, it leaves the audience with a thinly developed message and no sense of satisfaction. Surrogates wastes an opportunity to add an interesting dimension to the discourse about what it means to be human.