Lifeless Surrogate

Bruce Willis bad haircut is the least of his problems in "Surrogate," a disappointing sci-fi yarn that takes an interesting premise and botches almost every element of the execution.

The setting is present day Boston. And Americans have found the ultimate way to get fun without exercise. They're all plugged in to robots that live their lives for them. The robots are basically better looking versions of yourself or whatever you want to be. Each robot is controlled by the thoughts of its operator. The robot can be smashed, hurled off buildings, or blown to bits but the operator emerges without a scratch. But things go haywire so to speak when two surrogates are found murdered, along with their operators.

This type of thing has been handled before, and there are some interesting ideas about identity that can be explored here.
But instead it's just left on the table purely as an excuse to make a generic run of the mill action picture. Big thinking ideas are discarded in favor of car chases, explosions, and some half baked conspiracy plot involving the giant corporation that makes the robots and its renegade founder.

The movie doesn't even have the good sense to know that its sci-fi trash, and it is sorely lacking any sense of humor. Bruce Willis' expression moderates between the smirk, and his 'what the fuck' face.
The movie ends rather abruptly with one of the more pat, tacked on endings in history. It's as though the screenwriter simply stopped trying and just quit without trying to figure out what it all means.
But by the end of the film's mercifully short running time, I really didn't much care.

"Surrogate:" C-