Pierre Radulescu Robot Stories, created in 2003 by Greg Pak is his first (and so far his only) feature film. It consists of four independent vignettes, each one treating another aspect of our relations with the world of robots. A couple who wants to adopt a child gets a robot-baby instead, just for exercising. A mother tries to connect to his comatose son by sharing his passion: fixing robot-toys. A robot-worker gets in love with a female-robot. An old sculptor who will die soon has the option to become a robot and live for ever in a hologram.The movie got very controversial reviews. Some compared Robot Stories with other movies of the same kind to find out that everything that was to be said about robot stuff had already been said. Some others tried to consider the movie on its own merits. I think it should be considered also within the context of Greg Pak's creation, all his comics and very short movies (videos of less than 10 minutes, even less than 2 minutes): it is about the interactions between our universe and the universe of his comics.Robots were created with the aim to help us: in our work, or in our moments of fatigue, when we need some kind of intelligent toys to play with. Only it happened that robots went further and created their own universe, sometimes controlled by us, sometimes with them in control, sometimes cooperating with us, sometimes competing. Contacts between our universe and theirs can be sometimes beneficial for both, while many times it is about collisions with unpredictable outcomes. On the other hand, in most cases the universe of robots offers a window for us, to look into it: what happens there, in their world, is the objective image of what we are.If we consider now the four vignettes of the movie, we could say that the vision of Greg Pak about the matter is rather pessimistic. Babies are replaced by robots, communication between humans is possible only using robots, human sentiments are felt by robots only (and humans forgot about them), medicines cannot compete viruses any more while death sends human beings into the world of robots for ever. Is the picture too pessimistic? Well, let's put it this way: babies start being little savage robots till we learn how to communicate with them, communication between humans is ultimately possible, even if we need robots for that, and so on. Discussing this movie we can go either way. Plus think about that: the movie uses robots to describe our own world. Is it about them or about us? As I said, we can go either way.The first vignette (My Robot Baby) is funny and witty. What are babies after all, other than little savage and absurd things you cannot communicate with? Anything you try, they keep on crying. And only when you don't know what to try anymore and get discouraged, they start understanding you. The communication channel is set when the little thing realizes you can be weak, too.The second vignette (The Robot Fixer) is a little gem. Mother and daughter come at the bed of their son and brother: he lies in a coma, brain-dead, and the only decision to take is when to unplug him. The daughter realizes it very well, while the mother is thinking how to connect with the son in his last days. A set of little robot toys discovered in his little condo shows her that she knew the son very little. And the mother starts to learn about robots, to play with them, to fix the toys, to be at least now in synch with the boy. Is it too late? Is it useless? Maybe any human attempt is useless or it comes to late, but it doesn't matter. It has to be done.The third vignette (Machine Love) is funny, but rather weak, in my opinion. An android worker (nicely played by Greg Pak) is surrounded at office by humans devoid of any warmth, while he discovers, step by step, the miracle of love. I saw better ones, even between robots. The standard was probably set by Data, what do you think? As for the last vignette (Clay), it has a great subject, maybe difficult to be grasped. To continue your life for ever, frozen in a hologram, or to accept the dignity of your never more? Well, when you tackle with a great subject, you should have a moment of genius, to say there the ultimate truth. I think the moment of genius came for Greg Pak in the second vignette. But all in all, you shouldn't miss these four Robot Stories. They are uneven, that is true, but Greg Pak is a very cool creator.

srcann As a young teen, I was lifted to delight by Isaac Asimov and his robot stories. The late Isaac Asimov was president of The Humanist Society, succeeded by Kurt Vonnegut Jr. As a scientist and a humanist, Asimov used the frame of the robot story to illuminate human nature.Greg Pak goes a long way towards filling the Olympian shoes left by Asimov. In a very gentle, but textured, way, he uses "far-fetched" premises to examine subtle emotional events that are so close to us that they normally escape our notice.For a young film-maker, Pak has a firm grasp of sketching the subtlety of human feelings with an economy of style and an ability to direct actors to express them. I anxiously await his further artistic endeavors.

Danila Medvedev All things considered it was terrible. It would have been novel about 10 years ago, but now all the ideas have been explored much better by cinema and other media as well. The stories are too unsophisticated and do not go beyond "feel goodness". I am sure that artsy people who do not follow scientific and technological developments much and who are not really into sci-fi, may be pleasantly surprised and challenged by the ideas in these 4 stories, but for anyone, who have thought about these issues 10 years ago and have since moved on, these stories do not offer anything other than cheesy effects and lame acting.The first story has an interesting premise - a couple has to adopt a baby robot for a month as a test for their ability to adopt a human baby, but it really doesn't add anything to what was already covered in depth in Spielberg's A.I. and it also looks sh1t compared to an A-movie sci-fi such as A.I.The second story isn't really a science fiction film at all and is virtually content-free. The main idea is that it's sucks when your son lies brain-dead in a coma and you need to give doctors a permission to pull out the plug. Well, yes, indeed it sucks, but in what unique way does the story explore this problem? The third story is funny and even nice in some ways. It has some semi-interesting ideas about the future, but the overall message is pathetic - robots need some love too. Once again, there is nothing that wasn't said in, say, Bicentennial Man. And once again, the effects are non-existent and there is no depth.The fourth story is the most ambitious of all, and it probably fails less dramatically than others. But it still fails. May be the director had some deep message that he wanted to put there, but he probably forgot. Again, there isn't much in terms of original ideas - deathism, senile dementia and irrational stupidity. May be the viewers are expected to feel empathy with that old loser, I don't know... But I certainly didn't.Overall these films are probably worthless to a sci-fi fan. However, to a casual viewer, who lived in a cage for the last decade and was not exposed to even the simplest ideas about the future through Internet or magazines such as Wired, SciAm, Pop. Mech. etc., would probably enjoy these (especially if he's into independent Asian films). There is also some hope for Greg Pak, seeing as he is in the very beginning of his directing career. Hopefully, he will tackle these ideas better in the future. And it's also nice to see such interest to sci-fi themes among the juries.

rosscinema This is a film that examines the premise of robotics in four separate stories and the end result is both a hit and miss with some of the episodes better than others. The first story involves Marcia and Roy (Tamlyn Tomita and James Saito) who are given a small robot to care for and it monitors how well they take care of it and this is a test for them before they are allowed to adopt a real baby. The second story is about Bernice (Wai Ching Ho) who along with her daughter Grace (Cindy Cheung) visit her comatose son Wilson and they must decide whether to pull the plug on him since he is brain dead. Bernice discovers that he was an avid lover of robot toys and explores them to try and figure out things about her estranged son. The third is about a robot office worker named Archie (Greg Pak) who notices a female robot and falls in love. The fourth story is about John (Sab Shimono) who is a dying clay sculptor who doesn't want his consciousness to live on when a digital replica of his brain is made and he frequently talks to his dead wife Helen (Eisa Davis) who appears in holographic form.*****SPOILER ALERT*****This film is written and directed by Greg Pak (Who appears in the film) and he makes his feature film debut here with mixed results but his stories do have a way of making you think even if they leave you with no conclusion. This film is extremely low budget and it shows but what hurts this effort the most is the writing. The first story is well made but seems obvious and in the second you can't help but notice how cold and unaffected Grace is by her brothers condition. The fourth is the best and Shimono gives a splendid performance and if the other stories were this good than more people would be talking about this film. Director Pak in interviews has said that he made this because he always thought robots were "cool" and this does have an air of uniqueness that science fiction lovers will definitely want to check out. I do recommend this effort and it's because of the first and fourth stories with Tomita and Shimono giving solid performances. It's been way to long since I've seen Tomita in anything and I've always been a fan of hers since "The Karate Kid, Part II" and she has still retained her beautiful appearance. This is not a film for everyone but it's one that I do feel is worth checking out.