Short Circuit (1986)

This film is a classic. By classic I mean that it was on weekend movie marathons often enough while I was growing up for me to fall in love with it. This was, however, my first time watching the film in its entirety and uncensored. It’s still a loveable little flick and worth popping in for purely nostalgic purposes but even I have to admit that Short Circuit is little more than a fun guilty pleasure.

When a bolt of lightning scrambles the programming of a secret military robot, Number 5 becomes self-aware and escapes his military home base in a quest for knowledge. Upon meeting Number 5, Stephanie Speck (Ally Sheedy) thinks he’s an alien and feeds his request for input by allowing Number 5 to go on an all-night information bender of encyclopedias and late-night TV. When the military comes looking to find and destroy Number 5, Stephanie teams up with two of Number 5’s sympathetic creators (Steve Guttenberg and Fisher Stevens) to save the robot and help him find his place in the world.

This film has 80s guilty pleasure written all over it. Steve Guttenberg? Check. Humorous science-fiction? Check. Subtle anti-Reaganist sentiment? Check. I do have to say though that more than a few elements of Short Circuit just wouldn’t be tolerable anymore. Hollywood probably wouldn’t dare make a comedy about weaponized technology these days. That’s best left to doomsday-cautioning anti-military industrial flicks with bad acting and spooky music. And let’s be honest- it’s a wonder that Fisher Stevens’ (a white Jewish guy) portrayal of an Indian guy (with tan makeup no less) wasn’t decried back in the 80s.

Short Circuit spins a yarn that is cute but not very believable. Who in their right mind would hide and protect a lethal government robot? Why wouldn’t the government have an internal tracking mechanism on the unit rather than one that can be removed? On top of it all are action-comedy clichés like the good guy disappearing at the right moments to sneak up perfectly on the bad guys. If not for the sass and spunk of Number 5, this film would have been dead on arrival.

But Number 5 looks awesome and has the right blend of innocence and sarcasm to his personality to make him endearing. Once his circuits fry, he ceases to seem dangerous or threatening to our protagonists. You never truly believe that he is alive but he certainly puts himself on the line of potential sentience. Number 5’s construction also helps blur the line between human and machine, with features that mimic eyelids and movements oftentimes precise enough to almost be human.

As flawed as this film really is, the character of Number 5 carries the whole thing on his mechanical back effortlessly. Steve Guttenberg’s presence tells you the film will be corny but it also turns out to be a lot of fun. Hitting the right blend of one part drama and two parts comedy makes this film work. Too much drama and it would seem ridiculous and stupid. Too much comedy and it would be too cheesy even for a guilty pleasure. Dated as just about everything is in this film, I will always have a soft spot in my heart for Short Circuit.

RATING: 2.75 out of 5