Self-Aware Robots in Sci-Fi Action "Vice"

Iconic action stars Bruce Willis and Thomas Jane star in the futuristic action thriller “Vice” where a robot becomes self-aware that sets things apace when her dangerous escape starts.  

                

"Vice was built in the middle of a city and the problem is that people go in there and get their freak on, do all this crazy stuff, and then come back outside and think, 'I can get away with anything in Vice so why can’t I do it out here,'" begins Thomas Jane who plays detective Roy Tedeschi. The authorities are kind of hands off with Julian’s (Willis) robot creations because of all the tax revenue the resort generates. "But crime goes through the roof in my city and Roy gets a briar stuck up his ass about this Vice place. He is intent on shutting it down, bringing the place to its knees or blowing it up, whatever he can get away with.”

“I like these kind of characters, archaic guys who are living in an old world. It’s the old world versus the new world type of thing,” continues Jane.  “Roy’s the kind of guy that if four bullets will do it, he will use them.  He will never use just one; if he can empty a clip into you, why would he use just one?”  “Thomas is one of those very unique, eclectic actors that shows up on set and he breathes life into the character,” adds Miller. “He creates actions, movements, words, and situations that really take Roy to the next level; when you put Thomas in one of those action sequences. He just lights it on fire!”

         

“Julian Michaels' corporation has built Vice, a resort for the wealthy where they can do anything that you could possibly imagine, even murder, rape, or kill because the permanent Residents are artificial, cloned from human DNA and built on endoskeletons,” begins director Brian A. Miller. “The story revolves around a Resident that starts having memories of horrible things that have happened to her and she breaks out, only to discover the original creator of ‘Artificials’ and once they meet they decide to work together to take down Vice once and for all. I was immediately attracted to the script because of the way it takes a dystopian future and combines it with a perfect America we no longer have, and really turns it on its axis,” says Miller, a confessed sci-fi buff who grew up on “Blade Runner,” “Metropolis” and the “Star Wars” trilogy.

                 

“I was attracted to the story, the action and the arc of the characters, that is really what I was looking for as a director,” concludes Miller. “People nowadays live their lives vicariously through technology or social media. They’ve forgotten about interaction between human beings. I think people will relate to the character and the bureaucracy of what is going on in this film, including government that allows corporations more control without regulation.”

              
“On the surface, it’s a revenge story about an artificially intelligent being who becomes self-aware for the first time,” begins writer Andre Fabrizio, who shares a love of science-fiction with writing partner Passmore. “On a deeper level I think what appealed to Jeremy and I was more the inevitability of artificial intelligence and how it should be treated as well as the fact that there is an assumption that artificial intelligence shouldn’t be viewed with the same rights.”

                “Vice” opens January 28 in cinemas nationwide from Pioneer Films.