It's not the cheap. I don't mind movies done on the cheap, as plenty of low-budget features turn out great. Weirdly, I don't mind that it's ersatz Blade Runner, either. "There is nothing new under the sun," after all, and this kind of human/robot/AI exploration can be dynamite, if done well.
However, I wasn't a fan of this movie for other reasons.
First, the dialogue. Most of it was perfunctory. There wasn't anything special going on. Travis Fimmel chewed scenery as Marlon, which made his character kind of entertaining (if a little over-the-top) but the writing itself wasn't engaging. His lines aren't (to me) memorable. His character is just "rich guy who builds robots." He wants his daughter back. Okay. Anything else? Other characters are given a similar lack of interesting lines or original backstories. I did like David's backstory and Jane's struggles, but neither were fleshed out over the course of the script. We get David's in a couple of exposition dumps (and all but the pill-purchase is strictly by-the-numbers "gritty P.I." stuff - while I'm nitpicking). Jane's "machine questions identity" isn't original. That's fine, but again, it's not done particularly well.
It's not that they pillaged Blade Runner for their material, it's that they didn't seem to add anything special, new, or unique to those robot bones. The cinematography and music doesn't even feel like they thought about it too hard. They just went, "It looks/sounds like Blade Runner, too," and left it at that (but without the budget to make it work).
The counter-example would be Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang. That films paints by numbers. Its plot skeleton is that of every pulp detective story on the shelf. But what it brings to the table are unique, quirky characters, sparkling dialogue, and a winking homage/send-up of the genre it both is and has fun with.
At the end of Zone 414, my problem isn't that it's bad. That would almost be better. My problem is that it just feels like they did a minimal effort new paint job over top of Blade Runner and called it. It doesn't feel like anybody stayed up late working on this film. It doesn't feel like any of the creative team *loved* it. It's not that I hate the film, it's that I'm apathetic. It's just kinda "there".
I'll close on a positive note. Side characters were just weird enough to be slightly engaging (Royale, e.g.), but it's not enough. Towards the end of the film, one character ponders that God wasn't satisfied with creating until He made death. That's interesting, dark, and a neat insight into the character's motivations and psyche. If there was more of that, the film would have been great.
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