Jose Padilha who made his mark with hard hitting documentaries, and then later made the widely popular
Elite Squad and
Elite Squad 2, is a master of satire. His
Elite Squad franchise is an unrelenting look at the corruption of the Brazilian police force and politicians. He shows that no matter how big the corruption and greed it will inevitably lead to violence.
His latest challenge is trying to make
Robocop relevant again. One way to do that is to bring back that brutal social commentary that was done so well in the original. Verhoeven had a great way of making important commentary about the state of politics and voilence in 80's while hiding it behind a clever veil of humor.
What we know so far with the reboot is that Jose Padilha will bring back Alex Murphy, and he will focus much of the story on the transformation of Murphy into Robocop. Which is something Verhoeven did not spend a lot of time on in the original.
Padilha on the need for aggressive satire:
“The satire element of RoboCop is, I think, needed today. That kind of social, aggressive satire I haven’t seen done well in movies lately. And it’s almost like the politics and violence in the world is asking for this: 'Someone please make some satire now!' So we’re going to keep that edge.”
Padilah discusses when a message in a movie is misunderstood:
“I just don’t think about it. If people want to misunderstand it, it’s their problem.
“This is something that happened with films throughout history. Elite Squad became one of those. Taxi Driver is famous for that kind of misunderstanding. But, as a filmmaker, I don’t feel like constraining artistic expression by second guessing an audience. I have to be clear with myself and very conscious of what I am trying to say. Misunderstandings will always take place: it’s unavoidable.”
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