Bicentennial Man (film)

Bicentennial Man
Promotional poster
Directed by	Chris Columbus
Written by	Isaac Asimov Robert Silverberg Nicholas Kazan
Produced by	Michael Barnathan Chris Columbus Gail Katz
Starring	Robin Williams Sam Neill Embeth Davidtz Wendy Crewson Oliver Platt
Cinematography	Phil Meheux
Edited by	Neil Travis
Music by	James Horner
Production companies	Columbia Pictures Universal Pictures 1492 Pictures
Distributed by	Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group (North America) Universal Studios (International)
Release date	December 17, 1999 (1999-12-17)
Running time	132 min
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$100 million
Box office	$87,423,861

Bicentennial Man is a 1999 American science fiction comedy/drama family film, starring Robin Williams. Based on the novel The Positronic Man, co-written by Isaac Asimov and Robert Silverberg, which is itself based on Asimov's original novella titled The Bicentennial Man, the plot explores issues of humanity, slavery, prejudice, maturity, intellectual freedom, conformity, sex, love, and mortality. It was directed by Chris Columbus and a co-production between Columbia Pictures and Universal Pictures. The title comes from the main character existing to the age of two hundred years, and Asimov's novella was published in the year that the U.S. had its bicentennial.

Plot

The NDR series android "Andrew" (Robin Williams) is introduced in April 2005 into the Martin family home to perform housekeeping and maintenance duties. The family's reactions range from acceptance and curiosity to outright rejection and deliberate vandalism by Grace (Lindze Letherman), which leads to the discovery that Andrew can both identify emotions and reciprocate in kind. When Andrew accidentally breaks a figurine belonging to "Little Miss" Joanne (Hallie Kate Eisenberg), he carves a replacement out of wood. The family is astonished by this creativity and “Sir” Gerald Martin (Sam Neill) takes Andrew to his manufacturer, to inquire if all the robots are like him. The company's CEO (Stephen Root) sees this development as a problem and wishes to scrap Andrew. Angered, Martin takes Andrew home and allows him to pursue his own development, encouraging Andrew to educate himself in the humanities.

In 2025, Andrew has an accident in which his thumb is accidentally cut off so Sir again takes him to NorthAm Robotics for repairs, ensuring first that Andrew's personality will remain unharmed. Andrew requests that while he is being repaired his face be upgraded to allow him to convey the emotions he feels but cannot fully express. The bitter CEO informs them that upgrade modification will be very expensive—in fact, larger than the sum he earns in an entire year—but the price is well within the Martin family's means, comprising a month of Andrew's income from the sale of his carpentry and other woodworks and crafts.

After the wedding of Little Miss (Embeth Davidtz), Andrew realizes there are no more orders for him to run so he asks for his own freedom in 2037 much to Sir's dismay. His elderly owner grants the request but banishes Andrew so he can be "completely" free. As Andrew leaves, Sir comments that he has stopped referring to himself as "one". Andrew eventually builds himself a home at the beach and lives alone. In 2053, Andrew sees Sir one last time. On his deathbed, Sir apologizes for banishing Andrew knowing have his freedom was the right thing as he bids farewell to Andrew, stating that it was an honor serving him.

After reluctant help from Lloyd Charney (Bradley Whitford), Little Miss's son, Andrew goes on a quest to locate more NDR series robots to discover if others have also developed sentience. After more than a decade of futility, he finds Galatea (Kiersten Warren), an NDR robot that has been given feminine attributes and personality. These however are simply aspects of her programming and not something which she developed as Andrew did. Galatea is owned by Rupert Burns (Oliver Platt), the original NDR robot designer's son. Rupert works to create a more human look for robots but is unable to attract funding. Andrew agrees to finance the research and the two join forces to give Andrew a superficial human appearance. In 2073, Andrew comes back to visit but instead sees Little Miss has aged significantly meets Portia Charney (Embeth Davidtz), her granddaughter (Lloyd's daughter) who looks almost exactly like a younger version of Little Miss as a genetic likeness that skipped a generation. As Andrew gets to know Portia, Little Miss is hospitalized after suffering a stroke. Andrew and Portia visit her, noticing that she is clutching the wooden horse he carved for her when she was young. After Little Miss silently passes away, Andrew feels the pain of not being able to cry and realizes that every human being he cares for will eventually die.

Over time, Andrew and Rupert begin to study medical designs capable of producing mechanical equivalents of human organs, including a central nervous system, which eventually allows Andrew to acquire tactile sensations and taste. Meanwhile, his friendship with Portia evolves into romance. At first, Portia is uncertain about "investing her emotions in a machine" and almost marries someone else, but Andrew confronts her about her emotions and they eventually engage in a relationship that is both romantic and sexual. When both Andrew and Portia realize that their relationship would never be socially accepted, Andrew petitions the World Congress to recognize him as a human being, which would allow he and Portia to be legally married. The Speaker of the Congress rejects the proposal, however, arguing that while society can tolerate an everlasting machine, an immortal human would create too much jealousy and resentment.

Many years later, Portia is only physically middle-aged due to Andrew's medical breakthroughs but decides that she doesn't want to have her life prolonged forever. Realizing that he wouldn't want to live without her, Andrew asks Rupert to introduce blood into his system which will cause his brain to gradually decay and allow him to age. His elderly friend agrees, welcoming him to the human condition. Decades after they have become physically elderly, Andrew and Portia attend the World Congress for a second time so that Andrew can once again petition to be declared human. The World Congress decides to review the case before making a final determination, leaving Andrew to leave with Portia to await their decision.

Although they have become more physically older than any other human before, Andrew and Portia reside in a nursing home with life support machines by 2205 with Galatea (now human-looking) nursing them. All three listen to a broadcast from the World Congress in which the President finally acknowledges Andrew's humanity, declaring that at 200 years old he is, "with the exception of Methuselah and other biblical figures", the oldest human being in recorded history and validates the marriage to Portia. Despite his life support machine, Andrew peacefully dies while he is listening to the broadcast. Afterwards, Portia orders her life support machine switched off and she too quietly dies hand-in-hand with Andrew.

Cast

• Robin Williams as Andrew Martin
• Sam Neill as Gerald "Sir" Martin
• Embeth Davidtz as Joanne "Little Miss" Martin (adult) and Portia Charney
• Wendy Crewson as Rachel "Ma´am" Martin
• Hallie Kate Eisenberg as Joanne "Little Miss" Martin (age 7)
• Kiersten Warren as Galatea
• Oliver Platt as Rupert Burns
• Stephen Root as Dennis Mansky
• Angela Landis as Grace "Miss" Martin (adult)
• Bradley Whitford as Lloyd Charney (adult)
• John Michael Higgins as Bill Feingold
• Lindze Letherman as Grace "Miss" Martin (age 9)
• Igor Hiller as Lloyd Charney (age 10)
• George D. Wallace as the first President/Speaker of the World Congress
• Lynne Thigpen as the second President/Speaker of the World Congress

Reception

Bicentennial Man received mixed reviews; the film holds a 37% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes with 35 out of 93 critics giving it a positive review with an average rating of 4.8 out of 10, with a consensus saying 'Bicentennial Man is ruined by a bad script and ends up being dull and mawkish', while the review aggregator Metacritic gives it a score of 42.

Roger Ebert gave it two out of four stars saying, "Bicentennial Man begins with promise, proceeds in fits and starts, and finally sinks into a cornball drone of greeting-card sentiment. Robin Williams spends the first half of the film encased in a metallic robot suit, and when he emerges, the script turns robotic instead. What a letdown." William Arnold of Seattle Post-Intelligencer said the film "Becomes a somber, sentimental and rather profound romantic fantasy that is more true to the spirit of the Golden Age of science-fiction writing than possibly any other movie of the '90s." Todd McCarthy of Variety summed it up as "An ambitious tale handled in a dawdling, sentimental way".

Accolades

• Academy Awards — Best Makeup
• Blockbuster Entertainment Award — Favorite Actor — Comedy (Robin Williams)
• Blockbuster Entertainment Award — Favorite Actress — Comedy (Embeth Davidtz)
• Hollywood Makeup Artist and Hair Stylist Guild Award — Best Character Makeup — Feature
• Blimp Award — Favorite Movie Actor (Robin Williams)
• Razzie Award — Worst Actor (Robin Williams)
• YoungStar Award — Best Young Actress/Performance in a Motion Picture Comedy (Hallie Kate Eisenberg)

External links

• Bicentennial Man at IMDb
• Bicentennial Man at the TCM Movie Database
• Template:Allrovi movie
• Bicentennial Man at Box Office Mojo
• Bicentennial Man at Rotten Tomatoes
• Bicentennial Man at Metacritic