By Drew Dietsch
| Published
We live in an age where a giant robot movie doesn’t seem all that special. Thanks to over a decade of Transformers movies and the excellent Pacific Rim, the novelty of getting a giant robot movie that takes itself seriously is lost on modern audiences. But there was a time when fans of giant robots had to make do with cartoons and cartoons alone.
Thankfully, one man came along and changed all that with a giant robot movie that would eventually become the final release of a filmmaking empire. This director deserves far more appreciation than he gets today for blazing a trail in giant robot cinema.
Stuart Gordon’s Robot Jox
Director Stuart Gordon, best known for his H.P. Lovecraft adaptations Re-animator and From Beyond, was a fan of animated series like the popular Transformers and the influential anime Macross. He always wanted someone to make a live-action giant robot movie. So, once no one else stepped up to the plate, he set his sights on Robot Jox, a story about a divided future where disputes between the two remaining great nations are settled with gladiatorial robot fights.
Gordon teamed with sci-fi author Joe Haldeman, who had won a Hugo Award for his novel The Forever War. The novel is a science-fiction riff on Haldeman’s own experiences during his deployment in Vietnam. This would end up being one of the first factors that would lead to Robot Jox’s many eventual problems.
Haldeman and Gordon would butt heads on the tone of the story, with Gordon leaning towards things being more cartoonish and fun, while Haldeman wanted to explore some of the darker and more complex aspects of the idea. They knew they had to meet somewhere in the middle, but that wasn’t necessarily where audiences wanted to be with a giant robot movie. We’ll come back to that later.
Robot Jox Destroyed Empire Pictures
More important to the bigger picture of Robot Jox is the story of Empire Pictures, the low-budget genre studio from longtime producer Charles Band. Empire Pictures churned out tons of sci-fi and horror cult classics in the 1980s, including the Ghoulies, who made their way onto our own list of 1980s creature feature gems.
By the time Robot Jox spun up cameras in 1986, Empire Pictures was at the end of its rope. In fact, they pretty much put all their remaining eggs into the Robot Jox basket, and it ended up being the final film produced under the Empire Pictures banner.
Even then, the finished film had to be sold to another distributor in order to get things to the finish line, and the movie didn’t get a full release until 1990. It’s rare a long road to the screen like that helps a movie.
Robot Jox’s Influence On Disney’s Honey, I Shrunk The Kids
Another element that added to the post-production stress was Stuart Gordon having to run to one studio to finish putting Robot Jox together in editing and another studio headed by none other than Mickey Mouse. During the time he was getting Robot Jox ready, Gordon was in the development stage of Teenie Weenies (yes, that was actually the title), a Disney sci-fi family comedy about kids who get shrunk. Yes, Stuart Gordon was one of the original story developers behind what would become Honey, I Shrunk the Kids.
This was not a fond period for Gordon. It was the first time he worked with a big Hollywood studio, and he famously had no patience for all the Disney bigwigs.
Gordon claimed that he got a nosebleed during a business meeting just from the stress of dealing with corporate drudgery applied to art. It was so bad that Gordon left Honey, I Shrunk the Kids before it rolled cameras, and he never felt he could deal with any big studio again.
He remained an independent filmmaker for the rest of his career. Doing so didn’t make Stuart Gordon a household name, but it did mean he got to prioritize creativity in his work, leading to a diverse and compelling filmography.
It’s Called RoboJox, Not Robot Jox
So that whole business is going on while RoboJox is also on his plate. Yes, RoboJox was the original film title, but in the time it took to get the full film together, RoboCop was unleashed into movie theaters, and the distributor felt they needed to change the title so that it would not seem connected.
Poor Stuart just couldn’t catch a break, could he? He even liked to tell people that the “T” in Robot Jox is silent and still privately called the movie RoboJox even after it was all done.
What’s Great About Robot Jox
Well, let’s actually take a look at some of the things Robo- I mean, Robot Jox actually did have going in its favor. Like legendary designer Ron Cobb, who sci-fi fans instantly recognize as one of the key designers behind Alien. Cobb’s overall design for the two featured giant robots really gives the whole production a level up.
It doesn’t hurt that Empire Pictures’ behind-the-scenes mainstay, David Allen, lends his stop-motion talents to the big battles. Though we only get bookended robot fights, it’s forgivable when the effects are so fun. Still, anyone wanting more Robot Jox in Robot Jox has a valid criticism towards the movie.
Though it’s certainly on a B-movie budget, the sci-fi world of Robot Jox does tell you a good deal about the kind of society civilization now resembles after a devastating nuclear world war.
Gordon even took advantage of a real ad campaign in Rome encouraging women to get pregnant. That seems like some weird Handmaid’s Tale prop, and Gordon recognized it would lend the world of Robot Jox a seemingly larger thematic scope.
Though Gordon wanted the movie to be fun, he also wanted to take it seriously. He and his team did research by spending time at an Air Force base in order to nail down certain military lingo and procedures.
Gordon cites The Right Stuff, the brilliant film adaptation of Tom Wolfe’s landmark history of the U.S. space program, as his biggest cinematic influence for what he wanted to do with the movie. That commitment to the film’s belief in itself imbues Robot Jox with a lot of charm.
There’s A Problem With Tone, Who Was This Movie For?
However, remember that whole issue of warring tones in the story due to Gordon and Haldeman’s different takes on the material? Robot Jox can’t quite settle into the right kind of rhythm for what audiences expect out of a movie called Robot Jox. The opening credits miniature sequence, which was the first thing shot for the movie, looks fantastic but sets up a darker experience than parents and kids want from a big robot fight flick.
The inciting incident for the Robot Jox story is the death of an innocent crowd during a robot fight. It’s a great conflict for the movie’s hero, Achilles, but it also feels like a potential walkout moment for parents who brought their kids to see a live-action cartoon.
There are other shiny spots in Robot Jox, like Michael Alldredge as over-the-top American stereotype Tex Conway, who Gordon says was directly inspired by Ronald Reagan. It’s a goofy but pleasant piece of acting, but the performance of the movie belongs to Danny Kamekona as Dr. Matsumoto. Seeing someone give such weight to a tragic role in a movie like Robot Jox is always worth highlighting.
Robot Jox Fails And Becomes A Massive Flop
Sadly, no actor or ad campaign could save Robot Jox at the box office. Opening in 16th place on a budget Gordon claims was $6.5 million, Robot Jox barely eked out over $1 million.
Thanks to an extensive time getting to the screen amidst the dissolution of Empire Pictures, it was dead in the water. Though it ended up finding its audience on home video, it would be many years before the movie established itself as a cult film.
Stuart Gordon Made Robot Jox For The Right Reasons
Stuart Gordon didn’t make Robot Jox simply to capitalize on a trend or exploit audiences looking for some escapism. Stuart Gordon made Robot Jox because he wanted to see a live-action giant robot movie as a fan. He loved the genre and the imagination it brought to stories.
The failure of Robot Jox ended up being something of a black mark against Gordon in Hollywood, but history is the only true judge. Stuart Gordon is now a revered figure in genre movie circles.
In addition to his embrace by the horror movie community, sci-fi aficionados have discovered the pleasures in Gordon movies like Space Truckers, a light adventure in the mold of Robot Jox, and the must-see Fortress. Seriously, Fortress gets even more off-the-wall anime influence, and it’s the best RoboCop movie that has nothing to do with RoboCop. Imagine what the prisons in RoboCop are like and it’s Fortress.
Stuart Gordon passed away in 2020 at the age of 72, and though Robot Jox might have been a failure at first, Gordon’s legacy has given the movie new life and even new fans. From the silly to the serious, Robot Jox offers something you can find to enjoy.