PART I: PLOT
Sequence 1: Dream mode – Deep in the darkest pits of the ocean, the audience is introduced to The Three Laws that every robot must follow. As the laws “fade”, or bubble, in and out of the ocean, we see fragmented scenes of two people who are stuck in vehicles. The sequence ends with a robot crashing through a window shield of a car. With its eyes glowing yellow, the robot reaches his arm into the car to save a victim.
Sequence 2: Year 2035. Chicago. Detective Spooner wakes up from his dream, and engages in his “hip”, early morning routine before his apartment. As he walks the streets of Chicago, we see that robots are everywhere walking the streets as the humans do, and working in multiple industries. At his relative, Gigi’s house, we see Spooner expressing his disdain for the robots. Later after leaving his relative’s home, Spooner chases a robot, suspecting the robot of attempting to run away with a women’s purse, but really, the robot was delivering an inhaler to his owner. Concerned about Spooner’s mental stability regarding the robots, Spooner’s boss gives Spooner a warning later at a police station.
Sequence 3: Spooner gets a call at the police station and goes over to the U.S. Robots and Mechanical Men (USR) where its CEO, Dr. Lanning, has fallen hundreds of stories from his office and down to his death. Police believe it was suicide, but Spooner suspects it was murder. Spooner meets Robertson, a director who has worked with Lanning for 20 years. Robertson asks Dr. Calvin, a robot psychologist, to guide Spooner around USR as he conducts his investigation. Calvin introduces Spooner to the USR’s Virtual Interactive Kinetic Intelligence (VIKI) who was Lanning’s first creation and is responsible for all surveillance of USR and controls Chicago’s security protection systems.
Sequence 4: In Dr. Lanning’s office, Spooner inspects the building safety glass, claiming that it is not possible for Lanning to have crashed himself against the glass and out the building. Using his gun to inspect the office, an NS-5 robot jumps out of a bin of robot parts, startling Spooner and Calvin. For an unknown reason, the NS-5 does not listen to Dr. Calvin’s commands, and runs away as Spooner shoots it in the leg. Dr. Calvin tells Spooner that the NS-5 most likely escaped to the USR Assembly line where all NS-5s are currently being built. Once they arrive at the USR Assembly, Spooner uses the fact that the NS-5 robot does not follow the Three Laws to attempt to catch him. The NS-5 is then captured by the police.
Sequence 5: At the police station, Spooner interrogates the NS-5, who claims that his name is Sonny. Spooner accuses him of killing Dr. Lanning, which angers Sonny, causing Spooner to realize that Sonny can feel and exhibit human emotions. Robertson comes over to the station to take Sonny, claiming that Sonny can’t be tried for murder since he’s a robot and that instead, he must be decommissioned.
Sequence 6: Spooner goes over to Lanning’s house to investigate the truth about Lanning’s death, but the house soon gets demolished by a large robot. Spooner suspects that because Lanning’s house is linked to USR, that someone was using it to watch him.
Sequence 7: The USR’s next generation of robots, NS-5s, are released in Chicago, replacing the older robots which are being stored near Lake Michigan. As Spooner drives and works on the robot case, he gets attacked by several tons of evil NS-5s who are attempting to kill him. Later, the police state that Spooner was in a car accident, not believing his story about the robots. Spooner then gets suspended by his boss.
Sequence 8: Dr. Calvin visits Spooner’s home where he tells her the story behind why he hates robots so much. Through flashbacks, we see that Spooner’s car and another car containing a beautiful girl named Sarah was pushed into the ocean by a truck. The robot chose to save Spooner over Sarah because he was more likely to survive. However, Spooner instructed the robot to save her. Later, Spooner and Dr. Calvin visit Sonny who draws them a picture of his dream where a man is standing on a hilltop in front of a large bridge and before a large crowd of robot slaves.
Sequence 9: Spooner goes over to the bridge that Sonny drew in the picture to discover that the NS-5s are killing the older generation of robots. A robot revolution has begun. Evil NS-5s are released into the streets of Chicago, instructing civilians to return to their homes and that a curfew is now in effect. A battle soon breaks out between the NS-5s and the civilians.
Sequence 10: Spooner and Dr. Calvin sneak into USR to stop Robertson, who they believe are controlling the robots. They find Sonny, who is still alive due to Dr. Calvin. In Lanning’s office, they realize that Robertson is dead. Spooner then realizes that he was following the wrong bread crumbs because the actual leader of the robot revolution is VIKI. VIKI explains that her understanding of The Three Laws has evolved, and that in order to protect humanity, human sacrifices must be made.
Sequence 11: Spooner and Dr. Calvin run to VIKI’s central system in order to kill her. Sonny goes to a lab to get the nanites, which is a serum that would kill VIKI. VIKI releases an army of NS-5s on them to stop them. When Sonny returns with the nanites, Spooner orders him to save Calvin, while he catches the nanites, descends 30 stories to VIKI’s “brain”, and injects the nanites into it. VIKI dies, and the NS-5s and Chicago’s security systems are back to normal.
Sequence 12: Back to Robertson’s office, Spooner and Dr. Calvin discover that Lanning made Sonny promise to kill him so that his death could serve as a message to Spooner. Spooner does not arrest Sonny, and they shake hands as a sign of trust.
Sequence 13: The movie ends with a modification of Sonny’s dream where Sonny is the one standing on the hill near the Lake Michigan bridge.
PART II: FRAME SELECTION
Frame Time: 28:19
Word Count: 354
This frame is a mostly symmetrical, long shot. In the background of an interrogation room, we see a total of six police men (three on each side) who are all dressed in black and have their weapons aimed directly at the center of the room where Sonny, an NS-5 robot, sits. The camera seems to have taken this shot from behind Sonny because we see the back of Sonny’s body frame. The overall coat color of Sonny is light grayish, except for his arms and neck which are dark black. Sonny’s head is also grayish, allowing the audience to see his brain which has a blue glow. We can see that Sonny’s head is titled a little to the right, demonstrating that he is paying close attention to Detective Spooner who is standing a couple feet away from him. Spooner is wearing a light greyish and bluish shirt. He is also holding a light blue file that contains the records of Dr. Lanning’s death. Located in the center of the room and above the two characters is a large square vent which is exhibiting a white light that shines down on Spooner and Sonny. The light takes the attention away from the policemen and places the focus on the current tension between Spooner and Sonny. Additionally, the light is also effective at highlighting the intricate details of Spooner’s and Sonny’s bodily build. For instance, we can see how Sonny’s muscular arms and upper curvy body is actually similar to Spooner’s. In fact, the way that Spooner is leaning his body to the left almost makes it look like Spooner is mirroring Sonny as he looks down on him. What really interested me about this frame in particular is how Spooner is physically positioned to be Sonny’s superior, which is the same as the way all of the USR robots are being used to serve the human race. However, paying close attention to the parallels in their appearances disrupts that superiority for me. Especially, since we learn later in the movie that Dr. Lanning saved Spooner’s life by engineering a robot arm into his body.