Chappie's artificial intelligence asks real questions about human 'programming'

Chappie (rated R for violence, language, and brief nudity) is not so much a story about artificial intelligence as it is about human “programming.” Are we born blank slates? Does our DNA or our environment have the greater role in shaping our character? Director Neill Blomkamp insightfully portrays human nature through a self-aware robot, though a fatal flaw fouls the film’s finale.

Robot designer Deon Wilson (Dev Patel) endues a damaged robot, slated for destruction, with a consciousness program. The same day the robot is “born,” a trio of gangsters kidnaps Deon and his unique creation. Deon warns the gang members the robot, whom they name Chappie, has the mind of a human baby but will learn much faster than an organic brain can. Yolandi nurtures her new “child,” but Ninja and Yankie teach Chappie to steal cars and battle a rival gang. Deon tries to keep Chappie on the straight and narrow: “I am your maker. You must not engage in their crimes.”

Chappie learns his battery, damaged before he was born and irreplaceable, will run out in five days. He confronts Deon: “Why did you make me so I could die?” Chappie struggles with the moral ramifications of participating in a crime that might, as a result, preserve his life.

As in his 2009 film District 9, Blomkamp sets up his camera in the abandoned industrial parks and ghetto wastelands of Johannesburg, South Africa. Dilapidated buildings and deteriorated urban family units (gangs), equally unaware of their own hollowness, cling to existence on a debris-strewn terrain. Like its landscape, Chappie’s score throbs savagely: Ninja and Yolandi’s real-life hardcore rap-rave band Die Antwoord (whose videos and concert performances make Lady Gaga’s routines look like summer camp skits) contributes to the soundtrack.

Chappie is one part Terminator and one part 3 Gangstas and a Baby (Robot)—often brutish, at times tender, but also occasionally hokey (as was District 9, so it could simply be South African humor this American reviewer doesn’t get).

As it progresses, the story settles into the “wisdom” of the world: The power to save his soul rests in Chappie’s hands. Nevertheless, there’s a way that seems right to a man (and a robot), but its end is the way of death.