Bicentennial Man
Tags: philosophical, sci-fi

Plot synopsis:
A character named Andrew Martin requests an unknown operation from a robotic surgeon. However, the robot refuses, as the operation is harmful and violates the First Law of Robotics, which says a robot may never harm a human being. Andrew, however, changes its mind, telling it that he is not a human being.
The story jumps to 200 years in the past, when a robot with a serial number beginning with "NDR" is brought to the home of Gerald Martin (referred to as Sir) as a robot butler. Little Miss (Sir's daughter) names him Andrew. Later, Little Miss asks Andrew to carve a pendant out of wood. She shows it to her father, who initially does not believe a robot could carve so skillfully. Sir has Andrew carve more things, and even read books on woodwork. Andrew uses, for the first time, the word "enjoy" to describe why he carves. Sir takes Andrew to U.S. Robotics and Mechanical Men, Inc. to ask what the source of his creativity is, but they have no good explanation.
Sir helps Andrew to sell his products, taking half the profits and putting the other half in a bank account in the name of Andrew Martin (though there is questionable legality to a robot owning a bank account). Andrew uses the money to pay for bodily upgrades, keeping himself in perfect shape, but never has his positronic brain altered. Sir reveals that U.S. Robots has ended study on generalized pathways and creative robots, frightened by Andrew's unpredictability.
Little Miss, at this point, is married and has a child, Little Sir. Andrew, feeling Sir now has someone to replace his grown-up children, asks to purchase his own freedom with Little Miss's support. Sir is apprehensive, fearing that freeing Andrew legally would require bringing attention to Andrew's bank account, and might result in the loss of all Andrew's money. However, he agrees to attempt it. Though facing initial resistance, Andrew wins his freedom. Sir refuses to let Andrew pay him. It isn't long afterwards that he falls ill, and dies after asking Andrew to stand by his deathbed.
Andrew begins to wear clothes, and Little Sir (who orders Andrew to call him George) is a lawyer. He insists on dressing like a human, even though most humans refuse to accept him. In a conversation with George, Andrew realizes he must also expand his vocabulary, and decides to go to the library. On his way, he gets lost, and stands in the middle of a field. Two humans begin to walk across the field towards him, and he asks them the way to the library. They instead harass him, and threaten to take him apart when George arrives and scares them off. As he takes Andrew to the library, Andrew explains that he wants to write a book on the history of robots. The incident with the two humans angers Little Miss, and she forces George to go to court for robot rights. George's son, Paul, helps out by fighting the legal battle as George convinces the public. Eventually, the public opinion is turned in favor of robots, and laws are passed banning robot-harming orders. Little Miss, after the court case is won, dies.
Andrew, with Paul's help, gets a meeting with the head of U.S. Robots. He requests that his body be replaced by an android, so that he may better resemble a human. After Paul threatens legal action, U.S. Robots agrees to give Andrew an android body. However, U.S. Robots retaliates by creating central brains for their robots, so that no individual robot may become like Andrew. Meanwhile, Andrew, with his new body, decides to study robobiology – the science of organic robots like himself. Andrew begins to design a system allowing androids to eat food like humans, solely for the purpose of becoming more like a person.
After Paul's death, Andrew comes to U.S. Robots again, meeting with Alvin Magdescu, Director of Research. He offers U.S. Robots the opportunity to market his newly designed prostheses for human use, as well as his own. He successfully has the digestive system installed in his body, and plans to create an excretory system to match. Meanwhile, his products are successfully marketed and he becomes a highly honored inventor. As he reaches 150 years of age, a dinner is held in his honor in which he is labeled the Sesquicentennial Robot. Andrew is not yet satisfied, however.
Andrew decides that he wants to be a man. He obtains the backing of Feingold and Martin (the law firm of George and Paul) and seeks out Li-Hsing, a legislator and chairman of the Science and Technology committee, hoping that the World Legislature will declare him a human being. Li-Hsing advises him that it will be a long legal battle, but he says he is willing to fight for it. Feingold and Martin begins to slowly bring cases to court that generalize what it means to be human, hoping that despite his prosthetics Andrew can be regarded as essentially human. Most legislators, however, are still hesitant due to his immortality.
The first scene of the story is explained as Andrew seeks out a robotic surgeon to perform an ultimately fatal operation: altering his positronic brain so that it will decay with time. He has the operation arranged so that he will live to be 200. When he goes before the World Legislature, he reveals his sacrifice, moving them to declare him a man. The World President signs the law on Andrew's two-hundredth birthday, declaring him a bicentennial man. As Andrew lies on his deathbed, he tries to hold onto the thought of his humanity, but as his consciousness fades his last thought is of Little Miss.

Review: I heaven't read the book, but BICENTENNIAL MAN is a very touching and heartwarming movie about a house-robot (Robert Williams) that begins a 200-year journey to become and to be legally recognized as a human.
Owing to the fact that it is based on an Isaac Asimov story, `Bicentennial Man' turns out to be a more interesting and meaningful film than both its advertising campaign and its own opening section would indicate.
The caveat for those seeking out a fun film for the entire family is that this movie, though initially sold as a warm cuddly comedy in the tradition of say `Mrs. Doubtfire,' actually deals with some very heavy and heady issues like sexuality, aging and dying, which may make it less-than-ideal viewing for young children.The first section of the film is, by far, its weakest.
In 2005, the wealthy Martin family receives delivery of a brand new servant android (Robin Williams) who, almost immediately, begins to display a remarkable range of human emotions and interests.
The `wit' in the film consists, basically, of endless jokes about how Andrew takes all idioms at literal face value, a running gag that is, finally, as unoriginal as it is wearying.Then, however, just as we are about to give up hope in it, the movie becomes more intriguing.
In addition, James Horner's melancholic symphonic score, though a bit lubricious at times, does create an atmosphere of contemplative seriousness that perfectly matches the tone and purpose of the film.`Bicentennial Man' may not turn out to be what you are looking for when you first seek it out, but, if you approach it with an open mind and a certain degree of tolerance and indulgence, you may be pleasantly surprised and, perhaps, even rewarded..
This movie quite simply follows the life of a man trapped in a robots body and his quest to be accepted in the world, and be allowed to love and cherish the people close to him.I have to say that i didn't expect much from this movie, i thought it would be a kids film, full of typical Robin Williams style laughs, i was way off in my assumption.
This is probably Robin Williams's best performance and it is a very emotional journey through change and development of the human condition.Overall the film is quite amusing, very touching and is full of realistic characters all very well cast to not overshadow 'Andrew' as he quests over 200 years for acceptance.A great movie 9/10.
This is a great film and very much about family life, emotions, what it means to be human, and trying to better oneself through both serving others and learning with others about oneself.
So many have tried to create a sweet and funny story of the machine that would be man, but this is it's perfect telling.Only Robin Williams could play the unlikely hero of this story with perfect comedic timing and perfect emotional pitch.
BICENTENNIAL MAN (1999) ***Starring: Robin Williams, Sam Neill, Wendy Crewson, Embeth Davidtz, and Oliver Platt Directed by Chris Columbus.
Isaac Asimov, scientist, anthropologist, and philosopher all in one, thought of this Robotic subject beyond the mere joy of fantastic possibilities of computer technology -- it's a more encompassing inquiry to what if a Robot thinks, feels, loves, and yes, wants to be accepted as a human, the imperfections and all!
They highlight a well cast movie that will pull at your heart strings more than once, in a tale written by Isaac Asimov that brings a lot of human emotion to this science fiction piece..
Overall, despite these few flaws, this is one hell of a movie, and the fact that so many people didn't enjoy it as much as I did kind of makes me sad, as I genuinely think this is one of the smartest and most heart wrenching movies I've seen with Robin Williams, as it does a good job of not only having a few funny moments, but also having a lot of heart warming moments, whether it be Andrew slowly becoming human or Andrew finally finding love.
And the robot Adam Martin becomes so very appealing that you'll miss him when he eventually turns himself into Robin Williams.The movie is very honest and open about its emotions (though the Horner score goes too far in trying to appeal to OUR emotions), and Williams is -- surprise surprise -- excellent as the robot.
We believe in the character, we believe (mostly) in his world, and we believe in his journey toward humanity.It's too bad that so many people already regard Andrew as a kind of variation on Star Trek's Data, because he's really a robot of another color altogether.There are some missteps toward the end (where are all the other robots?), Galatea is an unnecessary character, and at times the characters seem to be existing in different movies.
It's been years since I read Bicentennial Man or the early robot stories that are more-or-less the basis for the movie but I found the movie entertaining and quite acceptable as an adaptation of Asimov's work.
Unfortunately, the story was Disneyized a bit and lost much of its raw emotional potential in translation from print to wide screen.I hope this movie will spark the interest of a new generation and encourage them to read the great science fiction stories, among which Bicentennial Man is surely one of the best.
The movie takes place for 2 centuries as Andrew the Robot learns to deal with human losses and changes.
Robin Williams does a great acting job, which makes up for some of the mistakes and bad storyline.Sam Neill is Sir, or Dad, who has just bought a bicentennial man called Andrew (Williams) - Andrew is desperate to become a part of the family, as much as he is desperate to become a man.The film is adorable, cute, and funny but it is also boring, romantic and silly..
It's touching and at times quite moving, bearing in mind that I'm not a big fan of slushy movies or Robin Williams (those to things seem to go hand in hand unfortunately.)The issues concerning artificial intelligence were explored adequately, but I did find myself wishing that plot would have taken a different route at times.
As a short story, Asimov's "The Bicentennial Man" is a very good one, though not as much as the ones in his proper Robot series.
Again some places were too much invented by Columbus e.g. the roboticist's workshop.Robin Williams gave a good performance as the robot, Andrew Martin.
We never went to see it at the theatre because the commercials made it look like a Mrs. Doubtfire as a play-thing robot instead of as a cross-dressing estranged dad.We (and especially I) were surprised to discover that Bicentennial Man is more a relatively faithful adaptation of the Asimov I, Robot novels and not a Christmas family movie about a toy robot.
Once you think you may be connecting with him and feeling what he feels, BAM, the movie just skipped 16 years, and you're left with, "Hey, wait a minute, I was just getting into that period."Robin Williams and the special effects guys did a fantastic job.
When Portia entered the movie it was no longer about Andrew trying to become human but about him being in love, the movie had strayed completely from the book.Asimov's Bicentennial Man was moving, and original, Chris Columbus' Bicentennial Man was to long, tried to be funny but was just profane, tried to be dramatic but was just dull and unmoving.If you want to see 'robot wants to be human' read Asimov's Bicentennial Man, not Columbus'..
I have to be honest here, at first I thought it didn't look all too good, no matter how many times my girlfriend said it was a great film.I was wrong (I know how much she likes to hear that lol).
Sure its not Citizen Kane or The Shawshank Redemption but its a great film, and Robin Williams is at his finest from start to finish, providing his trademark humour with the touching feeling and drama we all know he can play.Take my girlfriends word for it.
This movie deserves to be noticed among some of the greats, as it is a beautiful portrait of life outside human existence, and how one man can change the way the entire world views one thing.
I felt that Robin Williams started out well but failed to sustain his character.the movie wasn't a total failure- i enjoyed watching it, as did my three very young cousins- but i ended up being disappointed, particularly since there are many films that have dealt with this theme much better; from A.I. Artificial Intelligence to Disney's Pinochio..
I highly recommend this movie to fans of Robin Williams, Fans of sci-Fi Dramas, or to someone that is interested in watching a touching and wonderful film.
Sentiment is not normally a big part of his writing, but in this story he brought it fully to bear, and the film captures it maybe even more fully than the prose did.It is sort of a shame to me that this movie is so good, yet it chokes me up so often for its last two thirds that I can't really bear to put myself thru that emotional wringer very often.Robin Williams is brilliant.
One thinks that beautiful actresses (Embeth Davidtz, Monica Potter from Patch Adams) and talented actors (Oliver Platt, and Philip Seymour Hoffman from Patch) will have to start a support group for those whose careers have had to suffer through a Robin Williams "How I am a better Human than You" type movie.
One could not understand why Sir (Sam Neill's character) would think the audience is so dumb that he would have to say to Andrew Martin (Robin Williams) "You stopped referring to yourself as One" when the constant referral of one's self as One was extremely irritating to this viewer (er...one).
Indeed I did not know it had been made until several years later when I saw the video of Celine Dion's "Then You Look at Me", and recognized the scenes as being from the short story by Isaac Asimov.I immediately rented the video.This is the finest "Robot" movie ever, touching and funny.
Just as with the later "I, Robot", this movie takes a nicely written Asimov theme and repackages it for a generic audience with the taste, intellect, and attention span of a ten-year-old.There are a lot of poorly-made movies out there (sometimes I think I've seen all of them) but rarely am I as profoundly disappointed as I was with this film.
There was no need to have pointless humor here, nor a love interest, nor any number of other distractions (not to mention lightweight comic Robin Williams in the lead; this would have been a perfect role for an understated performance by someone like Kevin Spacey.) It's a pity that the executives chose the low-and-easy road rather than for once challenging, ever so slightly, their audience.A case in point: the profoundly stupid (no other word for it) scene near the beginning, when Asimov's famous "Three Laws of Robotics" are introduced.
Implicit in the spectacle was Columbus' disdain for science fiction and all who enjoy it, as if to say (to all the non-fans in his audience) "hey, here's the silly premise for this geek movie!" If you've never read "Bicentennial Man, it's conceivable you may well enjoy this film somewhat, as a typical mildly entertaining Robin Williams vehicle.
Staying true to the spirit of Isaac Asimov's books, "Bicentennial Man" explores the essence of human reasoning, thought, and ultimately love, through a fanciful and fun story of an intelligent robot.The movie is a must-see for all Asimov fans, and probably does the best job of all movies in depicting Asimov's world like he imagined it.
iRobot has much of the same thoughtfulness, but this movie is like reading the books with a film projector.This particular robot story focuses on relationships of love and caring between people - and in this case - people and robots, and the inherent conflict between eternal love and the finite lifespans of people due to death that ends most people's lives all too soon..
It had the right balance of emotions, drama and comedy.I don't even remember how many times I have seen this movie, and I still end up seeing it again whenever it is on TV.Despite the story being from an Androids perspective tells you a story about human emotions like never before.
The story unfolds over 3 generations of humans, and to pack all this time in a single movie and still make sense is a commendable job by the director.If you haven't seen it yet watch it right away!.
Robin Williams has tried very hard to play this straight, and although I don't know if he really got the tone right at all times, and let's face it, he was up against an almost impossible task in making a machine into a man within the space of two hours and 12 minutes, this film despite any faults it may have is damned important.
STAR RATING:*****Unmissable****Very Good***Okay**You Could Go Out For A Meal Instead*Avoid At All CostsBicentennial Man is overlong for a kid's oriented film.It could have been shorter by at least 20 minutes.I suppose an alibi for this overlengthieness could be that they did seem to be trying out a lot of new ideas here,some of which worked,some of which did'nt,like the best of them,I guess.The robot was quite impressive,but sadly moved a little too much throughout in a way I found unnervingly similar to the old Holland/Barrett commercials from the late eighties,with the brown,watercan headed guy,and his grey accomplice.Sam Neill gave an effectively moving performance as the head of the initial family who first own the tinman,as we see him grow through the ages,and become more attached to the robot as a real person ,rather than a simple creation.However,I was'nt entirely convinced by the robot's motivation behind becoming human.I could'nt see why he was'nt satisfied as the care-free creation he was,rather than as a human who could develop bad feelings towards people and things.The film was very funny in places too,especially at the beginning, and towards the end.It was a careful and observant mix of childish toilet humour,and more broad minded stuff.Towards the middle of the film,when the robot population has become an accepted part of the human race,is imaginative,and adds to the moving feel of the film,as we see robots who've crashed in an airplane crash ,and robots whose homes appear to have crashed down around them.The advanced Sci-Fi setting at the end is involving too.Ultimately,Bicentennial Man is an interesting collection of ideas ,which,though mostly successful,don't always blend well together.***.
No surprise the story came from a leftist highbrow like Asimov.The implication is that the elites (here, trial lawyers) will always save us; people cannot be allowed to decide for themselves what is acceptable, and what is not.Only faint cinematic vestiges here of the Three Laws of Robotics.I think Williams sensed that this effort was finally past the limit of what audiences would tolerate, especially in terms of leveraging drippy sentiment, and he would go on to seek 'edgier' roles..
The make up & sets are very impressive but director Chris Columbus work is uneven.Robin Williams does the best he can with a silver suit handicapping him a fair part of the film & then establishing his human condition slowing him down the rest of it.
And even though it may all look a bit superficial at first sight, I still find it a very nice movie to watch.Robin Williams plays the role of an android robot who has only one wish: to become a real human being.
I like Robin Williams but this film really isn't one of his best.
This movie's Andrew Martin was nothing like Asimov's positronic robots in his novels.
Bicentennial Man is nothing but a boring sentimental comedy/drama that can only deliver good acting.Intended to be a comedy,but prevails to be a drama,almost all of the comedy this movie has is basically childrens humor that can make the viewer laugh for about a second.The plot is boring,a robot wants to become human,the humor is terribly sad(The one your sister says has a nice ass-Bicentennial Man)Can people find that humor funny,maybe but it wares off if heard to many times.Robin Williams does give a great performance,and so does the rest of the family.Bicentennial Man does achieve the aspect of a drama,but it doesnt make up for a third rate plot,childish humor,and boringness.
Bicentennial man is the story of a robot played wonderfully by Robin Williams who starts out as the property of a family and as time passes he becomes part of the family and starts to have feelings.
Anyone who has ever watched more than a handful of episodes of "Star Trek: The Next Generation" will recognize the robot Andrew (played very well by Robin Williams) as Data - the artificial life form whose entire existence seems dedicated to becoming more and more human.
Oh, wait; this is the best Issac Asimov story of all time, and the music, even though it sounds pretty much like the sound track from The Mission, is one of the better film scores of the year.
The rest of the cast are equally up to the task, Sam Neill as the head of Andrew's original family deserving a special mention.This is a great movie to watch if you're a fan of Asimovian robotics or if you're looking for a warm-hearted scifi movie in general..
This seemed like a familiar "robot gets emotions" movie that has been done far too many times.
Robin Williams puts in an uncharacteristically good, serious and non-zany performance.The main attraction of this movie is that it takes a familiar story and extends the consequences further out in time.