With a name like Robot Dreams, it's impossible not to wonder immediately about electric sheep. It doesn't take long however to realise that this film has very little in common with the Philip K. Dick novel that became Blade Runner. In fact, it wears one of its more pertinent influences on its sleeve, with a number of overt references to The Wizard of Oz. Its two protagonists have much more in common with Toto and the Tin Man than they do with each other — one's a dog, and the other's a robot.
Set in 1980s New York City, we first meet Dog in a lonely apartment. They have little else than a TV and a family of birds that perch on the other side of their window for company. Dog's loneliness is only worsened by the vibrant city that surrounds them — where everyone else seems to be grouped with like-minded beings on a collective mission. With the weight of loneliness becoming unbearable, Dog builds Robot with the hopes of creating a companion.
It's difficult, if not impossible, to stop a smile from forming as the two take their first steps into the outside world together. They're instantly a unit, and it becomes about as wholesome as any film could hope to be — Dog introduces Robot to his world, and Robot bumbles around without any idea of how to interpret social cues. Some of the humour would quite easily be transposed into an episode of Mr. Bean, and just like Bean himself, Robot Dreams does all of its communication without any dialogue. The only words that exist in the entire film are either written on shopfronts and signs or are parts of songs.
A series of dates follow, and they both become more and more comfortable with the world around them as they become more comfortable with one another. They spend a night indoors watching The Wizard of Oz, take pictures in a photo booth, and roller skate in a park to Earth, Wind & Fire's ‘September' — a song that goes on to carry great significance. It's not clear whether it's a romantic relationship or a friendship, but that seems to be part of the idea at the film's core. As we watch them grow together without ever saying a word, it's natural to start hanging your own experiences of love and companionship onto these two characters.
Robot Dreams uses its incredibly sweet foundations to grow into something with a wealth of emotional depth. Through a series of unfortunate events, Dog and Robot are separated from one another and forced to adapt to new lives apart. They both dream of being reunited, and they do what they can to make it happen, but the question of whether they were really supposed to be part of each other's lives forever is considered. This is as much a celebration of finding mutual happiness in moving on as it is anything else — if it's starting to sound like Past Lives, that's because it is.
We get the fullest experience of every character's perspective as we go from one phase of their lives to the next. Initially coupled together out of necessity, with Dog lonely and Robot a fish out of water, they seem to outgrow the need for one another's companionship, simply wanting to share in one another's lives instead.
This isn't writer-director Pablo Berger's first film without dialogue — in 2012 he made Blancanieves, a black-and-white silent retelling of the ‘Snow White' fairytale — but it is his first animated work. This time, Berger has taken the lead from Sara Vanon's graphic novel of the same name, which Robot Dreams is adapted from. It's clear to see the incredible care taken, not only to preserve its universal language of no language at all, but also to do no more than subtly refine its art style into a new format. Apart from being a little cleaner, it does feel as if the graphic novel could've just sprung to life.
Robot Dreams is both melancholic and sad and yet just as refreshing and life-affirming. In creating a world without spoken words, we're given two characters who are allowed to be whoever we want them to be — all we know for sure is how much they mean to one another, and how they approach the world around them. That's enough to create an intensely relatable experience. It perhaps doesn't teach us anything new, but it does provide a safe space for us to come to terms with whatever experience we attach to it.
Robot Dreams is in cinemas 22nd March in the UK
